


The Fear of Falling

by InspectorBoxer



Category: Birds of Prey (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-05-05
Updated: 2012-07-14
Packaged: 2017-11-04 21:44:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 31,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/398511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InspectorBoxer/pseuds/InspectorBoxer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a mission goes wrong, Helena sees Barbara in a whole new light.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. I started this one a while back (years ago, actually) and I'm now pressing hard to finish it.   
> 2\. The character of Nicole Kincaid is my own. No need to try to figure out where she came from...   
> 3\. Thanks a bunch to fallon_ash for the beta!!

Music throbbed from the club across the street, so thick and heavy Kincaid could feel it in the soles of her boots. The shop window behind her vibrated a half beat behind, and she spared it a quick glance, wondering if she’d chosen the wisest place to stand and watch the entrance to wait for her prey.

The smell of rain hung heavy in the air, but the drops had yet to fall. Lightning flashed overhead, arcing across the night sky and striking one of the skyscrapers that rose from the streets of downtown New Gotham. The ensuing crash of thunder was drowned out by the deafening music.

Kincaid watched the lightning fade before her gaze tracked back to the entrance of the club, fixing on the door with angry intensity. The air felt charged, and she breathed it in, waiting for the moment, waiting for her chance. 

“Hey, baby,” a young man called to her as he passed by with his friends. They were all twenty or less in age, clearly with nothing better to do on their Thursday night than troll the streets. She didn’t even turn her head as she felt their eyes crawling all over her.

“I’m talking to you, sugar,” he tried again, running an impetuous finger down the sleeve of her black leather jacket.

She looked at him then, seething that her focus had to shift from her target. His dark blue eyes were decidedly glassy, and Kincaid muttered a few choice epithets in her head. Just what she needed. Four horny and high frat boys.

“Go away,” she said simply, but there was an edge of warning to her voice they didn’t heed.

“What’s a fine looking thing like you doing out on the street? You turning tricks, hon? I’d like some of that action,” he said with a drunken, lewd laugh.

Her jaw bunched. “You couldn’t afford or handle me,” she replied.

Frat boy’s friends all shoved him and snickered. She didn’t have time for this. Her eyes went back to the front door, assessing.

“Wanna bet?” He looked her over, liking what he saw. She was definitely older, maybe in her early thirties. Her blonde hair framed her face in gentle shoulder-length waves. He reached out to see if the strands felt as silky as they looked.

The next thing he knew he was on his knees.

He screamed as his wrist was bent backward with negligent ease. He pawed with his free hand at her grip, but it didn’t move or lessen.

His friends started forward to help only to freeze when Kincaid lifted her pale blue eyes to their faces. There was something in her gaze that rooted them in place.

“I’m going to say this one more time,” she leaned over and breathed next to his ear to be heard over the pulse of the music. “Go away.” Giving his wrist a final squeeze to emphasize her point, Kincaid then watched with little interest as tears sprang to his eyes.

He staggered back when she released him, cradling his injured wrist against his chest. His eyes were wide as he regarded her with both rage and fear.

“Don’t be stupid,” she muttered, reading which of the emotions was close to winning his internal debate. “Walk away while I’m in the mood to let you.”

“Come on, Joey,” one of his companions said. He gave her a quick, jerky nod before dragging his buddy to his feet. 

The other two boys nodded in rapid agreement. Kincaid almost had the urge to smile.

Joey stuck his good hand out at her and pointed with attempted bravado. “Watch your step, bitch. I catch you down here again I’ll…”

“Right,” Kincaid drawled impatiently. Her gaze went back to the door, dismissing him.

The four boys stared at her, sensing they were playing with something they shouldn’t. Grumbling, they wandered off in search of safer entertainment.

Kincaid sighed as she felt her heart beginning to slow. A flash of relief swept through her at the knowledge that she wasn’t going to have to put four frat boys in traction for picking the wrong girl to tangle with. Hopefully now, however, they’d think twice before messing with any other member of the female persuasion tonight.

The door to the club suddenly opened, and Kincaid tensed. A man emerged and nodded at the two bouncers. He exchanged words with them before pointing at three young women waiting in line. They all squealed with delight and were ushered inside.

Kincaid scowled at their sheer shallow stupidity before her gaze focused with laser intensity on the man walking away down the street.

Alone.

Her eyes tracked him before her feet finally followed. He had to be the one. Near six four, sandy blonde hair, a cut and hard physique clear through the tight fit of his clothes. His suit probably cost more than most people made in a month. But he wasn’t most people.

Neither was she.

Arrogant bastard. Kincaid followed him around the corner, out of the line of sight of his goons working the door to the club. The fool was making it too easy. He was walking toward his black Mercedes. No guards. No protection. Like nothing could touch him.

“We’ll see about that,” she whispered as her steps took her into the street, angling toward him at a leisurely pace. A few drops of rain splattered her knee-length black leather jacket, but she paid them no heed.

“Mr. Draco?”

Kincaid paused at the low, feminine voice that unexpectedly came from the shadows. The man turned and looked into the alleyway near his car. 

“Yes?” he asked slowly. His hand went none too casually to the gun hidden on his hip by his jacket.

A woman emerged from the darkness, and Kincaid was as stunned as Draco to see she was in a motorized wheelchair. Kincaid forced herself to keep walking, hopping the curb and continuing on down the street until she could hide in the shadows and listen.

Draco relaxed when he saw the woman who had addressed him. Obviously no danger there, he assumed. His cold gaze swept over her, noting her beauty. He wondered if her legs were the only things that weren’t working below her waist. A smile carved across his features. “Who do we have here?”

“Barbara Gordon,” she answered evenly as she brushed a stray lock of red hair away from intense green eyes.

“The Commissioner’s daughter.” Draco’s smile broadened in bemusement.

Barbara said nothing.

“So what can I do for you, Ms. Gordon?” Draco asked with just a hint of suggestiveness. He planted one foot on the curb and gazed at her with open curiosity.

Watching from the shadows, Kincaid wondered if the redhead had any idea who she was talking to… what he was capable of doing to a woman. Determined not to let Draco hurt anyone else, she slipped a small throwing knife from a scabbard at the back of her belt.

“You’ve been dealing at my school. You’re going to stop,” Barbara explained.

Kincaid took a sharp breath. Whatever had happened to the woman’s legs must have messed with her mind as well. You didn’t just go ordering the biggest drug lord in New Gotham around unless you had a death wish.

Draco laughed, a grating sound. “Oh am I now?” he asked, not bothering to refute her comment. “And what school is that?”

Barbara’s eyes narrowed. “We had three students overdose this past week. Two of them are dead. One is a vegetable. You come near my school again with that garbage, and you’re going to wind up like they did.” 

“Dead or a vegetable?” he teased.

“Depends on my mood,” Barbara answered.

Draco came closer, enjoying the evening’s little diversion. “You don’t look like you’re in a position to harm anyone.” His eyes drifted lazily over her legs, noting for the first time that her chair was more technologically advanced than he had ever seen. “Nice wheels.”

Barbara stared at him blandly. 

“Look,” he said with a little more force. “No one tells me what to do. And no one goes around threatening me. People who do wind up like your precious students.” 

Kincaid took a step toward the edge of the shadows.

Barbara glanced in her direction. “Don’t do anything stupid,” she said with a little more volume before her gaze lazily drifted back to Draco as if the words had been meant for him alone.

Kincaid blinked, realizing that the redhead knew she was there. 

“I can do anything I want, Ms. Gordon,” Draco laughed. “And not you… or your precious father… can stop me.” 

With a quick lunge, he went for her. Draco wondered what it would be like to fuck a woman who couldn’t run away. He’d take her in the alley. Right in her damn chair.

Kincaid bolted from the shadows as he moved only to draw up short when Draco unexpectedly howled in pain. The drug lord dropped to his knees, reminding her of the frat boy she’d so easily dispatched earlier. Barbara had some kind of stick against his throat and wore a very bored expression. Those green eyes lifted and met Kincaid’s for a string of heartbeats. 

When Barbara finally looked away, Kincaid was painfully aware of how hard her heart was pounding. It seemed to be slamming in time to the distant music, making her almost cough with the force of it.

Barbara leaned closer to Draco, upping the voltage on the eskrima stick in her hand. Adding an electrical charge to the weapon had seemed like overkill, but Helena had insisted. Now she had to admit the upgrade was coming in handy. Draco whimpered, his body twitching as the current lapped through him. His gaze met the hard emerald of her eyes, and his soul told him something his brain had been unable to see. Chair or no chair… this was not a woman he wanted to cross. He could feel it in his blood, an instinct he never ignored that had managed to keep him both in business and alive.

Still jerking, Draco lifted his hands in surrender, and Barbara lowered the stick. He sank back against the dampening concrete. “I’ll stay away.”

“This is temporary,” Barbara vowed. “I’m going to stop you permanently. Just not tonight.”

Draco looked at Barbara with disbelief. “I know who you are. After tonight, I’ll know where you teach. I can get to you at anytime.” 

“You can try. Could be fun,” Barbara practically purred. “Now I suggest you move on. If I find out you’ve dealt at my school again, I won’t be quite so polite next time.”

His eyes darted over the chair and the woman, confused by the contradictions. Nodding once, he got unsteadily to his feet. Draco looked around, glad that no one had witnessed his humiliation at the hands of a cripple.

Staggering to his car on shaky legs, Draco slipped inside. His eyes went to Barbara’s face one last time, seeing the cold, calculating look on her pretty features. He shivered.

Some cripple.

His perceptions now completely altered, Draco started the car and roared away.

The sky chose that moment to open up with force. A loud crack of thunder sounded overhead, and a deluge of rain sheeted down soaking everything almost instantly. Barbara barked out a harsh laugh as she collapsed her weapon and tucked it into the side of her chair. “Great, I take down a drug dealer with negligent ease, but my wheelchair will probably short circuit on the way home.”

Kincaid wasn’t sure, but she suspected she was the one being addressed. Her anger at Draco had tumbled to the back of her mind, her curiosity with the redhead taking precedence. Carefully, she stepped into the glow of the street lamp.

Barbara looked at her then, having only caught a glimpse of the woman as she had crossed the street earlier. She was about five six with very pale blue eyes. The stranger looked dark and feral in her leather jacket, boots, and jeans. Her wet hair only added to her air of danger. “What did he do to piss you off?” she asked just loud enough to be heard over the rain and music.

The tempo in the club changed into something darker, more seductive. The pulses of bass drawn out and heavy.

“He killed my sister with his poison,” Kincaid finally replied after an intense moment of studying the other woman.

Barbara took a breath. She had assumed it had been something like that, but it made her feel no better to have her suspicions confirmed. “I’m sorry,” she said sincerely.

Kincaid came closer, only aware she was doing so when she stopped in front of Barbara. “I’m sorry about your students.”

Barbara closed her eyes for a brief moment before opening them again. She looked up through the rain at the other woman. “You were going to kill him.”

“Yes.” Kincaid didn’t bother to deny it. “You wanted to. Why didn’t you?”

“We don’t kill.”

“We?”

Barbara took another deep breath. “I don’t kill,” she clarified. “Makes me no better than him.”

“You would have felt better.”

“For a fraction of a second there would have been satisfaction,” Barbara agreed. “But it wouldn’t be worth the price on my soul.”

Kincaid blinked and looked away feeling both chastised and chagrined. “It’s just…”

“I know,” Barbara answered solemnly. “You want justice. Trust me. In the end you’ll get it. But not that way. That isn’t justice.”

“What would you call it?”

“Murder.”

Kincaid’s stomach rolled. From the truth or being denied what her heart begged for she wasn’t sure.

Coming to a decision, Barbara moved forward. “Come on. Let’s get out of the rain. I kept you from becoming a killer tonight. Least you can do is buy me a cup of coffee.”

****

Kincaid glanced around the all night diner. The place was mostly empty save for a young couple completely lost in each other in the back corner booth and a couple of cops sitting at the counter. A waitress was setting their coffee cups right side up and filling them with something that smelled strong enough to peel paint. Kincaid cupped her hands around the warming ceramic but didn’t drink.

“Thanks,” Barbara told the waitress and received a tired smile in response before the older woman shuffled away. Her gaze shifted back to Draco’s would-be killer. In the dim lighting, she could make out the other woman’s features more distinctly. Classic lips, a defined jaw, prominent cheekbones… She wondered if she was as beautiful dry as she was wet.

For some reason, the thought brought a blush to Barbara’s cheeks. She covered by taking a sip of her coffee. “So,” she said when she’d swallowed.

“So,” Kincaid echoed neutrally. She suddenly wished she was back in Chicago sitting in clean, dry clothes as she watched a Cubs game on television. Her finger traced the rim of her cup. “You do that often?”

“Do what?” Barbara asked as she watched her.

“Confront powerful drug dealers in nothing more than your wheelchair and a smile?”

The question struck her funny, and Barbara laughed. “Did it seem like I needed anything else?”

Kincaid lifted her gaze from her study of the chipped Formica of the tabletop to the intense green of Barbara Gordon’s eyes. A smile twitched at her own lips. “I guess not. What was that you hit him with? A cattle prod?”

The laughter wound down, but the smile remained. “Just a custom made toy.”

“Some toy,” Kincaid muttered but she let the subject drop. Questions about her late night coffee companion crowded her tongue but went unspoken. “That’s quite a chair you’ve got there.” She reached out and fingered the console closest to her. Barbara had parked it next to the table before sliding easily into the booth.

Barbara watched the stranger but made no move to stop her. “Thanks. It suits my needs.” She regarded her, seeing the questions in her companion’s eyes. “Go ahead and ask.”

“Ask what?”

“What everyone always wants to know,” Barbara murmured as the blonde continued to study the chair with naked curiosity. “How I got to be in a wheelchair in the first place.”

“I imagine you’re tired of answering that question,” Kincaid said with more understanding than Barbara was prepared for.

“I…” For the first time that night, Kincaid watched Barbara Gordon at a loss for words.

Barbara took another sip from her coffee. “I was shot. Joker had a vendetta against someone I knew. I was a convenient target.”

“Joker?” Kincaid tasted the name. She suspected she’d heard it on the news on one of the rare occasions she turned it on.

“You don’t know who the Joker is?” Barbara asked with some disbelief.

“I’m not from around here.”

“I gathered.”

“You ladies ready to order?” the waitress inquired as she returned.

“I’ll have the pancakes,” Barbara replied and handed the menu over without ever having opened it.

“Sure thing, Ms. Gordon. And for you miss?”

“Sure, pancakes are fine.” Kincaid waited until the waitress was gone and then leaned forward. “I heard Draco say you were the Commissioner’s daughter.”

Barbara folded her hands on the table. “I am.”

“You work for the police?”

“Not hardly,” the redhead answered archly. “I’m just a teacher.”

“Just a teacher,” Kincaid drawled. “Right.”

Barbara smiled. “What about you? I’m guessing skulking in the shadows for drug lords isn’t your usual occupation.” She had yet to ask the stranger for her name, hoping the blonde would supply it when she was ready.

Kincaid leaned back. “First time for everything,” she muttered. “How did you know I was there?”

Her question neatly evaded, Barbara shrugged. “I heard your jacket creak.”

“You’re kidding.”

Barbara merely gave her an enigmatic smile and took another sip of her coffee.

Kincaid thought about that, deciding there was no way Barbara could have heard her over the music. The woman had to be jerking her chain. “So is that something like your other senses became more enhanced when you lost your legs?”

“Did I lose my legs?” Barbara asked. She glanced down. “Huh, they still look like they’re there to me.”

Fortunately the waitress chose that moment to return with their food, giving Kincaid a chance to extract the foot she’d shoved tonsil deep into her mouth. “Sorry. I didn’t mean…”

Barbara held up a hand. “It’s okay. I’m just messing with you.”

“Doing a right fine job of it,” Kincaid confessed in a grumble as she poured syrup on her pancakes and began to methodically slice them up, noting that Barbara was doing the same.

Suddenly, Barbara tilted her head as if she were listening to something.

“What?” Kincaid asked.

Barbara didn’t answer for several tense seconds. “I’m sorry. I just remembered something,” she lied easily, having had plenty of practice. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to take a rain check.”

Kincaid realized she wasn’t ready for the conversation to end. She reached out and covered Barbara’s hand with her own as the other woman started to lay money down on the table. “My treat, remember?”

They both stilled at the contact.

Barbara pulled her hand away, a confused expression on her features. “Thanks. I’m really sorry…” She moved gracefully into her chair.

Kincaid opened her mouth to say something only to close it with a click when Barbara’s chair moved back without any apparent command from the woman sitting in it. “Barbara, wait,” she said when she found her voice.

The redhead looked up, impatience in her eyes but polite interest on her features.

“You said you were going to stop Draco. Let me help.”

Barbara hesitated, torn between finishing this conversation and getting to where her friends were in sudden and dire need of her assistance. Even now Dinah was yelling into the communication device nestled in her ear.

Kincaid reached into her pocket and withdrew a slim wallet. She pulled out a card then wrote something on the back of it before handing it to Barbara. “Call me when things… calm down.”

Barbara took the card and glanced down at the name. Nicole Kincaid. Surgeon. “Things never calm down,” Barbara admitted. “But I’ll call anyway.” 

“She ditch you, honey?” the waitress asked a few minutes after Barbara had left the diner.

“Apparently,” Kincaid drawled, but without rancor. She pulled over Barbara’s pancakes and dumped them onto her own plate. “More for me, I guess.”

“Don’t fret none,” the waitress said gently. “Ms. Gordon is a right busy woman. We see her in here all the time. She’s rarely gotten to finish a meal.”

“That’s too bad. The pancakes are great.”

The waitress beamed before walking away, leaving Kincaid in silent contemplation. What in the hell would keep a wheelchair bound teacher out so late so often?

She vowed to find out.

****

“You are such a piece of work.”

“If you hadn’t gone all Gorillas in the Mist on his ass…”

“Is that a crack about my animal side? Because if it is…”

“Ladies!” Barbara yelled impatiently and was rewarded with sudden, blessed silence. “Thank you.” She turned away from the other Birds, both as damp as she was, and wheeled herself over to the Delphi terminal as the elevator door closed behind the other two women. 

“Smartass,” Helena added to her younger companion.

“Better than a dumbass,” Dinah shot back before stomping up the steps to her room and slamming the door.

Barbara bit her lip on that one. The young blonde was coming along in the comeback department much to Helena’s frustration.

“I know you’re smirking, Barbara,” Helena muttered. She ran a hand through her short, choppy black hair. Her eyes followed Barbara’s movements with affection that she’d managed to keep out of her voice. 

Barbara’s smirk turned into a full-fledged grin. She felt Helena’s warm presence against the back of her chair as the younger woman looked over her shoulder. 

“So have you found the one who got away, yet?” Helena leaned closer, soaking up Barbara’s heat and taking a deep, appreciative breath of her perfume. 

“Give me a second to at least check,” Barbara drawled as her fingers worked the keyboard. As the system began running, she glanced to her left at Helena’s profile and frowned at the nasty bruise staining her friend’s cheek. Barbara reached out and lightly touched the injury. “You okay?”

Helena met Barbara’s gaze at close range before her own fingers brushed her friend’s as she touched the purpling injury herself. “Fine. It’ll be gone by tomorrow.”

“Probably,” Barbara admitted. “But it looks painful right now.” 

“Eh.” 

The redhead sighed and let her hand drop reluctantly, knowing that was all she was likely to get from the younger woman. They’d been friends, practically family, for eight years. Sometimes she wondered why she still asked.

Data started to stream across the computer screen, and Barbara turned her attention to it, barely aware when Helena put her hands on either side of her chair and leaned in over her left shoulder.

“What are you wearing?” Helena asked unexpectedly.

“What?” Barbara asked, distracted.

Helena smiled and moved closer, almost nuzzling the older woman’s neck. Her gaze drifted up over the slope of Barbara’s cheek, and she watched as her friend’s intense green eyes scanned the incoming information for clues. Barbara was so beautiful, Helena thought wistfully. Beautiful and blissfully ignorant of the effects that beauty had on the people around her.

Helena especially. 

“I said,” Helena pitched her voice low and watched with interest as goose bumps rose on Barbara’s skin in response. “What are you wearing?”

The typing stopped and Barbara leaned back. Helena shifted to give her some space, but kept her hands on either side of the chair. Barbara felt fenced in but oddly it wasn’t unpleasant. “What do you mean ‘what am I wearing?’” 

Helena gave her a crooked smile. “Your perfume.”

Barbara cleared her throat and looked away as she felt an unexpected blush heating her cheeks. “I don’t know. Something Dinah gave me for my birthday.”

“The kid has good taste,” Helena murmured before releasing her grip on the armrests and standing upright again. 

Barbara shot a quick peek at the younger woman as she scratched the side of her nose, wondering what to say or how to react to the compliment. “Uh…”

“Look. There’s your guy.” Helena nodded at the image that had popped up and was now filling the monitor.

Grateful for the distraction, Barbara returned her attention to the computer. “Robert Vargas. Age 26. Single. Arrests for assaults, B and Es, attempted murder. Nice.”

“Just the kind of guy you bring home to mom,” Helena muttered. “Well, actually that would be true in my case,” she joked.

Barbara shook her head. “Catwoman had more taste than to run with scum like this guy.” She gave Helena a backward glance. “And your mother sure as hell would never have had someone like this around after you were born.”

“It’s funny.”

“What?” Barbara continued to skim the arrest record.

“How you defend my mom sometimes considering everything she did.”

The hands on the computer went still. Barbara took a breath before turning her chair partway around so she could face the woman behind her. “Your mom became a very different person after you were born.”

Helena held up her hand. “I didn’t mean to invoke some serious chat about my mom here. It was just a random observation.”

Chase or retreat? Barbara tilted her head as she regarded her friend, weighing which option was best for their moods and mindsets. “Okay,” she said easily. “But you know if you ever do want to talk about your mom…” 

Helena shrugged, only to wince as the motion caused other injuries to make themselves known.

“What’s wrong?” Barbara’s voice sharpened with concern.

Helena waved a hand as if the pain were nothing. There had been a lot of bad guys tonight, and they’d been pounding on her something fierce when Barbara and Dinah had gratefully shown up. Then her anger had nearly gotten the best of her and she’d gone… well, ape, apparently, if Dinah’s Gorillas in the Mist crack had been accurate.

The wheelchair rotated again, and Helena took a step back. “Where are you hurt?” Barbara demanded, wondering if this would be one of the rare times when the younger woman let her help.

“I’m fine.”

“Helena, those guys got in some good hits before we got there.”

“They sure did,” Helena replied drolly, trying to play off the pain. Then she felt warm fingers grasp her right hand, and her well of words ran dry. Barbara always had that effect on her.

“This is going to take a few minutes,” Barbara said with a nod at the terminal. “Why don’t we get you fixed up?”

Helena started to protest only to give in and sigh. With a truth she didn’t dare study too closely, she liked having Barbara tend to her. “Fine,” she muttered as if she were being put out.

Barbara didn’t buy it for a second, but she didn’t let on either. She tried to tamp down the flicker of pleasure that flared at Helena’s acceptance. 

Dinah’s door opened at that moment, and the blonde teenager stomped down the stairs and into the kitchen, a towel around her neck, without sparing either of them a glance or a word. 

Helena and Barbara watched her progress only to burst into laughter once the teen was out of earshot. Helena shrugged. “So it was a good comeback. She’s entitled to one every now and then.”

Barbara squeezed the hand still safely ensconced in her own. “Which one? The Gorillas in the Mist thing or the dumbass comment? Personally I liked…”

“No comments from the peanut gallery,” Helena smoothly interrupted. “I’m going to go get a shower.” She held up her hand to forestall Barbara’s protest. “Then you can patch me up. I’ve got motor oil, ash, and God only knows what all over me. You need to get out of your wet clothes, too.”

With a sigh, Barbara relented. “Fine. Hopefully I’ll have some good news by the time you get out. And I’ll change in a few minutes.” Helena looked at her dubiously. “I promise.”

With another wink, Helena departed. Barbara watched her friend bound up the steps with feline grace. Even when her legs had still worked, she never had been able to move like Helena. Then again, no else could either.

Shaking off her thoughts, Barbara turned back to the terminal, watching the various scans run. A thought niggled at the base of her brain, and she fished in her pant pocket, pulling out the slightly creased business card.

Nicole Kincaid.

Barbara frowned as she fingered the corner of the card. Several quiet minutes passed as she drifted in her thoughts, the Delphi computer running its scans. 

“What’s that?” Dinah asked as she emerged from the kitchen. Her gaze flickered over the room, looking for signs of her tormentor.

“She’s taking a shower,” Barbara replied to the unspoken question. With only a twinge of guilt, she handed the card to the blonde. “Do you get anything off this?”

Dinah set down a grilled cheese sandwich next to Barbara’s elbow. The redhead realized the food was for her and she grinned, thinking about the pancakes she’d given up earlier. Barbara slipped off her glasses as Dinah took the card out of her hands, her face going momentarily blank.

“Thanks,” Barbara said as she took a healthy bite of the sandwich. “You getting…” her voice trailed off when she saw the tears on Dinah’s face. She snatched the card out of the girl’s hands and watched in horror as Dinah slumped to the floor, unconscious.

“Helena!” Barbara screamed. With a curse, she let herself slide down her chair and crawled to the blonde’s position. Her fingers went to Dinah’s throat, finding a steady but fast pulse.

“What?” Helena was suddenly there, dripping wet with a short blue robe wrapped around her. She knelt next to Barbara. “What happened?”

“I gave her a business card. I wanted to see if she could get anything on the woman who gave it to me.” Barbara pulled Dinah’s head into her lap and began to stroke the girl’s forehead.

“Apparently she did,” Helena muttered. 

“Dinah? Dinah, can you hear me?” Barbara mentally kicked herself for not running a check on Nicole Kincaid first.

“She hurts…” Dinah whispered as she drifted toward awareness. “God, she hurts…”

“Who does she hurt?” Barbara demanded.

Dinah’s eyes blinked open, staring at the ceiling. “No… she’s… she’s in pain. Her sister…”

Helena blew out a breath that stirred her damp bangs. She reached under the girl and hefted her into her arms, feeling the tension slide into Dinah’s muscles as they stood. “Easy. I’m just moving you to the couch.” 

Dinah released a shaky sigh as reality returned. She felt the cushions on the couch give under her weight, and she sank into the softness gratefully. Her head came up as she heard Barbara utter a curse. Helena was now trying to get the redhead back into her chair, but Barbara was resisting, insisting on doing it herself. Barbara didn’t see the ghost of hurt that crossed Helena’s face. It was gone by the time the redhead was back in her chair.

Helena turned and for a second her eyes met Dinah’s, a sad understanding passing between them. 

“I’ll get you some water,” Helena choked out to Dinah before heading toward the kitchen.

Barbara ran a hand through her hair, waves or irritation radiating off her.

“She just wants to help,” Dinah complained.

Green eyes snapped up to the blonde, and Dinah worried she was in for a full Barbara Gordon blow out. Instead, the redhead cursed and looked away.

“I’m not mad at Helena. I’m mad at myself. I should have checked her out before giving you the card.”

“Nicole?” Dinah asked for clarification. She heard water running in the kitchen. 

Barbara didn’t answer.

“She isn’t evil or anything,” Dinah murmured, trying to be reassuring. “It’s okay to be attracted to her.”

Barbara’s head whipped around just as they heard a glass hit the floor and shatter. They both turned to see Helena standing in the doorway, her eyes wide.

“Shit,” Barbara hissed under her breath, not knowing why she didn’t want Helena to have that particular piece of information. “Dinah…”

The teenager realized she’d just made things worse, not better. 

****

Helena retreated into the kitchen without a word. Her stomach was now in knots and she felt the burn of tears. Barbara was attracted to a woman? When had Babs switched teams? Or did she always bat for both, and Helena had never realized it? Her instincts prickled with awareness, and she turned to see Barbara in the doorway.

“Hel…”

“I was just getting another glass of water for the kid.” Helena sprung into motion, retrieving a glass from the cupboard. 

“Helena, look at me,” Barbara pleaded.

“Everything’s cool,” Helena could hear the lie and knew Barbara wouldn’t buy it. “The glass… it just slipped…” She swallowed around an odd, crushing sense of betrayal. With more force than necessary, Helena turned on the water and thrust the glass into the cold stream.

“Hel…” Barbara tried again. She rolled into the kitchen, doing her best to block Helena’s most likely choice of escape.

“You’re probably tracking glass,” Helena said as she shut the water off. “You don’t want to puncture a tire.” She leaned against the counter, still unable to meet those green eyes.

Barbara took a breath, wondering why she felt like such an ass even when she’d done nothing wrong. “They can’t puncture,” she muttered. She stared at Helena’s back, wanting more than anything to see the blue of her eyes. “Look at me.”

Knowing that she was only delaying the inevitable, Helena finally turned and lifted her gaze to Barbara’s.

“I…” Now that she had Helena’s attention, Barbara wasn’t sure what to do with it. “Dinah just…”

“She picked up this woman’s emotions as well as yours. You both touched the card. Stands to reason,” Helena said a little hoarsely.

“What she picked up on,” Barbara continued, wondering why Helena seemed so bothered by Dinah’s declaration. It wasn’t as if the notion of being attracted to another woman was something new to Helena. She was pretty sure the younger woman had sampled the other side of the fence more than once. “She picked up on…. a moment. Nothing more.”

Helena took a breath, wanting the reassurance. “You’re attracted to her?” she asked unsteadily.

Barbara moved closer. “I… there was just a moment where… I don’t know.” She shook her head and sighed. She heard the Delphi alarm beep and grimaced.

“We should check that.” Helena started past her, forgetting the water entirely, when she was suddenly brought up short by Barbara’s warm touch around her wrist. Her breath hitched at the contact, and she prayed Barbara didn’t notice.

The redhead tilted her head back to look up at Helena’s familiar features. “Nothing is going to happen with her,” Barbara felt the need to say. “It was just… an instant. An instant where…”

“You found her attractive,” Helena breathed, but she made no effort to pull free.

“Yeah,” Barbara said softly. She tried to lighten the mood. “I guess I’ve been out of the dating pool too long since Wade…” 

Helena sunk down to her knees so she could look up at Barbara. “I’m sorry,” she almost whispered. “I don’t know why. That just threw me for a loop.” She ducked her head only to raise it again when she felt Barbara’s fingers on her chin.

“Something tells me you think I’m utterly bland and boring when it comes to sex,” Barbara teased with a glint in her eyes.

Helena’s brain was screaming at her to say something, but the words wouldn’t come. “Uh… you were my teacher,” she croaked as if that explained everything. Her breath came out in a barely controlled shudder as Barbara’s hand went from her chin to cupping her cheek. 

Something thick and heavy seemed to settle between them at the contact. Barbara watched, fascinated, as Helena’s pupils contracted and then narrowed into feline slits. “I see,” Barbara replied slowly, her voice descending an octave. “You probably think I only know the missionary position.”

“Barbara!” Helena spluttered in mortification, doing her best not to let her mind imagine Barbara in that very pose.

Barbara responded with a wicked chuckle as her thumb unconsciously began to stroke Helena’s cheek. “I was once a daredevil like you, Helena,” she murmured. “Remember? I used to run the rooftops of New Gotham at night. I took my fair share of risks and loved the rush of the adrenaline as a reward.” 

Barbara’s playful little game was one Helena knew well but had never dabbled in with her friend. It was a line she occasionally stared at but never crossed. With growing courage, she stepped up to the edge of it. “Well, if you ever want some tips on getting a… rush… with a woman, you know where to find me,” Helena managed, letting a little of her sensuality shine through and knew that Barbara had noticed when the older woman’s eyes widened fractionally. Playing with fire, Helena ducked her head and leaned closer.

For a dizzying moment, Barbara thought Helena was going to kiss her. A breath before their lips met, Helena detoured, threading her hand through Barbara’s hair and pulling her forward before placing a swift kiss on Barbara’s forehead. Then the younger woman stood, snatched the glass of water, and disappeared through the doorway. 

Breathe, Gordon, Barbara had to tell herself. She sucked down an aching breath as a shiver slid through her. “What the hell was that?” she asked the empty kitchen.


	2. Chapter 2

Helena shivered and burrowed further into her knee-length leather jacket. It provided scant protection against the bitter wind blowing through New Gotham, bringing with it the first hints of fall. Around her, the balcony glistened from the recent rain, the dampness only adding to the pervasive chill. The city lights shone weakly through a gathering fog, beacons of color seeming to float in billowing gray. The smells, sounds, and sights were all a perfect fit for Helena’s darkening mood. 

Barbara was attracted to a woman, so strongly that Dinah had picked up on it instantly. Even through the pain and anguish Dinah had detected off the business card, Barbara’s interest in this woman had punched through. The kid didn’t hit on anything that didn’t at least rate a six or higher on the emotional impact scale. There must have been some serious heat.

Kind of like what she’d felt between herself and Barbara in the kitchen. Helena wondered what Dinah would have thought about that.

Her thoughts scattered and frenetic, Helena could only close her eyes and beg her mind for silence. She breathed in the damp air, feeling a fine mist lightly bathing her features. Sighing, Helena walked to the balcony rail and leaned against it. The prudent thing would be to go back inside to the dry warmth of the clock tower, but somehow the mid-September night appealed more to her spirit at the moment. She put her elbows on the rail and looked over, watching patches of traffic crawl by below.

“You going to stay out here all night?”

The voice made her jump. Helena turned to see Dinah watching her from the doorway. It was disconcerting that she’d been so lost in her thoughts she hadn’t even heard the kid. So much for super powers. “Shouldn’t you be in bed? It’s a school night,” Helena muttered derisively. 

Dinah rolled her eyes as she stepped out onto the balcony. “I’m still a little juiced from what happened earlier,” the teenager admitted. “I have to let the emotions fade.”

Helena turned and hitched a hip on the rail. She played it casual and managed not to ask which of the emotions it was that was keeping the teen awake. “You okay?”

Dinah shrugged. “Other than still tasting shoe leather from where I stuck my foot in my mouth? I’m fine.”

A slow, begrudging smile wormed its way onto Helena’s features. She dipped her head before looking up at Dinah through her wet bangs. “You just said what you felt.”

“Maybe. But there is a reason God graced us with internal edit buttons. Apparently mine was malfunctioning.”

The smiled widened a bit. “I doubt Barbara is mad.” It was true, Helena acknowledged. Despite the fact Barbara clearly wished Dinah hadn’t shared such a juicy morsel of information, there was no way the older woman was angry about it.

Dinah sighed. “I know she isn’t. Honestly, though, I’m more worried about how you feel.”

Helena’s head came up. “Me?”

“I said what I said without regard for your feelings. That was insensitive of me.”

Helena wasn’t sure what part of the whole conversation she should start addressing first. “You didn’t even know I was in the room,” she muttered when she could think of nothing else to say.

“But I knew you were in the tower. And I know how you feel about…” The teenager bit her lip and cast a look over her shoulder. Barbara was inside, just beyond the glass, sitting at the Delphi terminal, oblivious to the serious conversation about her taking place a few yards away.

“Dinah…” Helena’s voice came out rough and tired.

The blonde looked back at her older companion. “You can lie to yourself if you want to, Helena. But you can’t lie to me.” Dinah noted the caught expression on the other woman’s features and felt a twinge of sympathy. They’d never talked about what was so clearly between Helena and Barbara before, but Dinah figured if they were ever going to address it, now was the time. Her relationship with the other meta was an antagonistic one, but Dinah loved Helena Kyle like a sister, and she hated knowing Helena was in pain. “I would never tell her.”

Helena looked away, feigning casual interest in the surrounding buildings. Inside, her heart was pumping so hard she could feel the beats in her throat. “Look, kid…” She glanced back at the teenager when she thought she had enough control reflected in her features. “I do care about Babs… but whatever you’re thinking…”

“I know you care about her,” Dinah interrupted, sounding more like the parent than the child at the moment. “But your feelings for Barbara are even more than you realize, Hel. I just… I don’t want you to run from the way they make you feel.”

Blue eyes studied her with such intensity Dinah almost looked away.

“I don’t run from anything,” Helena finally rasped.

“Then don’t start now. You’ve been neatly evading the whole thing, but you gave a part of yourself away tonight. Barbara is going to wonder why her being attracted to a woman bothered you so much.”

“Maybe I’m a prude,” Helena retorted flippantly.

“Maybe the Penguin will sprout real wings and fly,” Dinah smacked back.

A black eyebrow arched neatly. “That was pretty good.”

“I’ve been practicing.”

Helena sighed and crossed her arms. The cold was starting to make her bones ache. She thought about Barbara’s offer to tend to her injuries. How nice it would feel to have Barbara’s warm hands on her, soothing her pains. As usual, she didn’t examine too closely why she wanted the redhead’s touch, but Dinah’s words made her aware of her denials. “On a scale of one to ten.”

“Huh?” Dinah blinked.

“On a scale of one to ten… how attracted was Barbara to this chick?” Helena decided a diversion was in order. This way she got to satisfy some of her curiosity as well.

“I’m not telling you that.”

“Come on. You’re acting like my ally here. Give me a little intel.” Helena’s features relaxed into a seductive grin.

“Are you admitting you’re attracted to her?” Dinah asked warily.

“I’m admitting nothing. Now spill.”

“That’s personal.”

“So personal you blurted it out to the room?”

“I didn’t know you were there,” Dinah almost whined. “What difference does it make?”

“None at all,” Helena lied smoothly. “I’m just thinking this woman had to be hot to stir up Barbara’s blood.”

“Nicole.”

“What?”

“Nicole Kincaid. That’s the woman’s name. She’s some sort of doctor.”

Smart and gorgeous, Helena thought bitterly. Great. “Lucky her.”

“What I felt off her business card… the last word I’d use to describe her is lucky.” Dinah swallowed at the remembered emotional agony. “She’s… really hurting right now.”

Feeling a little chastised, Helena sighed again. They both heard the door open and looked back in time to see Barbara roll out onto the balcony.

“What are you two doing out here? It’s freezing.”

“Just chatting,” Dinah said easily. “Helena’s finally promised to show me how to rappel.”

“I have?” Helena muttered, confused only to suddenly realize the teen was covering for her and raced to agree. “I have. Right. Rappelling. Absolutely.”

Barbara narrowed her eyes at both of them. She had a sliver of suspicion about the topic of conversation before she’d interrupted. “Are you talking about Nicole?”

“Who?” Helena managed in an impressively bland voice.

“Nicole Kincaid. The woman I met tonight.”

“Is that her name?” Helena asked innocently. “The topic never came up.”

Green eyes fixed on Dinah, and it was all the teen could do not to squirm. Barbara might not be a meta, but she sure seemed to have powers like one. Sometimes the teenager was sure the redheaded woman was psychic. “What?” she asked, hoping she sounded breezy and not busted.

Quietly proud of the younger woman, Helena ducked her head to hide a smile.

Barbara shook her head. “Fine. You two metas may be able to stand the cold, but I’m going back inside. Especially since I’m heating some milk for hot chocolate.”

“Hot chocolate?” Both of the younger women chimed in eager unison.

Still shaking her head, Barbara went back inside. Helena bounded after her, holding the door for Dinah.

“Eight,” Dinah murmured as she passed.

“What?” Helena asked blankly.

“The attraction. It was an eight.”

Helena stood there, the door still open, as she processed that bit of news. Something inside her went colder than the night air. Barbara had claimed that nothing would come of what she had felt, but how did you turn your back on an eight?

She hoped Barbara would find a way.

****

“That’s it. I’m packing it in.” Dinah yawned half an hour later before setting her empty cup down. “I’ll get the dishes in the morning.”

“Damn right you will,” Helena teased with a smirk. She easily caught the pillow the blonde tossed at her and then offered a jaunty wave as Dinah headed up the steps toward her room.

“I should probably hit the road, too,” Helena admitted after a moment of charged silence. She put the pillow down and got to her feet, momentarily losing her concentration when she glanced down into Barbara’s upturned features. Helena felt the familiar wave of emotions rolling toward her at the sight. With a sigh, her mental levee repelled them. Best not to go there. Not to let those waves pull her in and under. Helena knew if she ever gave them free reign she would drown.

“You okay?” Barbara asked softly. There was something terribly endearing about Helena when she got that little lost, confused look in her eyes. She’d see it every now and then when she’d catch the younger woman looking at her. Barbara always wondered what Helena was thinking in those moments but had never found the courage to ask. This time was no different.

“Fine.” Helena offered her a smile to prove it. “I’m just going to go get my things.”

“You never let me take care of those cuts,” Barbara pointed out with just a hint of hurt to her voice. 

Helena stopped as she made her way toward her jacket. “Uh…” She hated it when Barbara used that tone with her. It did things to her insides. “I just thought… you know… it’s late…”

Barbara sat aside her mug and motioned Helena to sit next to her on the couch. The brunette hesitated before slowly yielding to what her body craved and came closer. Helena noted the first aid kit on the table for the first time and wondered how she’d missed it. “Babs, it really is late. You don’t need to…”

“I know. I think I can manage to keep my eyes open for a few more minutes,” Barbara teased faintly. “Where is it the worst?”

Helena sank down onto the couch. “My back,” she admitted after a moment. “I must have gotten cut or something.”

Frowning, Barbara waited for Helena to turn before gently lifting the younger woman’s thin sweater. She hissed at what she found. “Christ, Helena.”

“Bad?” The younger woman asked. She tried to turn her head to see but that only tugged on the injury. “Stung like a mother in the shower.”

“I’ll bet. Someone stabbed you.”

“Ah. Explains a lot.”

Barbara snorted at the other woman’s casual attitude. The bleeding had fortunately stopped long ago, but the wound was an angry red and the skin had yet to knit back together. Had this been anyone else, Barbara knew they would be in the hospital in serious condition. She gently brushed her fingers along the sides of the injury feeling the skin ripple in response.

“Tickles,” Helena lied, her voice sounding breathless.

Barbara reached for the iodine and some cotton balls. “Let me just clean this up a little.”

Helena closed her eyes at the gentle touch that followed. What would it be like, she wondered, to feel that touch all over?

Do. Not. Go. There.

Bitterly Helena closed the lid on those thoughts. Then she felt the ghost of Barbara’s breath on her bare skin, and she felt that lid crack open a notch. “So.”

“So,” Barbara mimicked as she finished with the iodine and applied some ointment for the pain.

“You going to see her again?”

“Who?” the redhead asked distractedly. She applied the ointment liberally, hating to see her younger friend in pain. Barbara patted a bandage in place then let the sweater slip down over the smooth expanse of skin.

“Nicole.”

“Nicole?” Barbara wiped her hands on her jeans then decided to make the most of Helena’s cooperative mood. She put her hands on the younger woman’s shoulders and began a gentle massage.

“Kin…” Helena’s voice caught and faltered at the touch. Her eyes fluttered closed. “Kincaid,” she croaked, trying not to moan.

“Oh.” Barbara’s brain worked out what Helena was talking about. “I said I’d help her with Draco, so I guess so.”

“You don’t sound excited by the idea,” Helena pointed out. A soft groan escaped her as Barbara found a tense knot in her right shoulder and began to work on it. She was damn good at this, Helena noted. Barbara’s touch made her want to stretch out like a cat in the sun.

“Does that hurt?”

“Feels good,” Helena admitted before she thought better of it.

A flicker of a smile crossed Barbara’s features. “You’re nothing but knots. You should see a massage therapist.”

“You’re cheaper,” Helena teased. She frowned when she felt Barbara’s hands move away. She glanced over her shoulder, worried she’d offended her friend. Barbara’s touch abruptly returned, but this time it slipped under Helena’s sweater to massage bare skin.

Breathing became something Helena had to consciously concern herself with. “Um…”

Barbara felt the younger woman tense. “Relax. I’m just putting on some liniment.”

The scent of wintergreen reached Helena, followed by the slow spread of heat through her abused muscles. She sighed it felt so good. Surrendering to the care, Helena leaned forward, granting Barbara all the access she wanted to her aching back. “Thanks,” she murmured softly.

“What are friends for?” Barbara asked, enjoying the chance to take care of the younger woman for a change. Not that she ever wanted Helena to hurt, but she took pleasure in making her friend feel better when she did. Helena’s skin was warm and soft beneath her fingertips, pliant under her ministrations. “See what you’ve been missing out on by turning me down every time you’re hurt?”

Helena could hear the smile in Barbara’s voice. “As often as that is, you’d tire of this pretty quickly.”

The redhead frowned when she realized her friend was right. About the hurting part anyway. “I hate it when you get hurt,” Barbara said softly. “I just wish…” She sighed, knowing there was no point letting her mind walk down that tired, bitter path.

Helena pulled away from Barbara’s touch so she could look at the older woman. “I can take care of myself,” she replied gently.

Barbara laid her now idle hands in her lap. “I know that,” she answered as she studied her fingernails intently. “It just feels sometimes… like… you have to fill the role I had to leave behind. A role you don’t want.” She looked up then, straight into a pair of stricken blue eyes. She shrugged and glanced away, uncomfortable with the turn in conversation. 

“I do this because it needs to be done,” Helena murmured.

“But not because you want to do it. Not like I did.” Barbara risked looking at her again. Helena was so damn beautiful, a wild animal barely tamed. There was always an air of danger around Helena, an air of primal sensuality. Barbara sighed. “Helena, I don’t want you to feel that this has to be your life’s work. I don’t want you to feel that you have to do this out of some obligation.”

“To you?” the younger woman asked hoarsely. They’d had similar discussions in the past, but she’d always seen them coming, had always had her flip answers ready. But Barbara had caught her with her defenses down tonight. To her surprise, she was in no mood to put them up. “You think I do this because you took me in when no one else would? Or worse, do you think I feel sorry for you because you’re in a wheelchair?”

Barbara blinked, startled faintly by Helena’s frank questions. She bit her lip. “Do you?” she whispered, finally asking a question she’d always wanted to ask but had never spoken for fear of the answer.

Helena closed her eyes, unable to bear the uncertainty in her friend’s features. “Babs,” she choked out. “When have I ever done something I didn’t want to do?” She slid to her feet and put some distance between them, walking away a few paces before finally turning and facing the redhead again. “I do this because I can, because I need to make a difference.” Her gaze swept over Barbara’s legs. “I do it in part because of you. But it’s not because I feel sorry for you. I do it because I want to protect you. I want to keep you from getting hurt again.”

“There is no guarantee that won’t happen, Helena,” Barbara answered honestly.

“But if I wasn’t there to stop it I would never forgive myself.”

“I don’t want you to live your life in fear of that. I don’t want you living this kind of life if there is something else you want. My fate is still my own, and I accept whatever will come. And if someone gets to me someday…” Barbara broke off when Helena turned her back and walked toward the windows overlooking the balcony. “It won’t be your fault,” Barbara finished in a hushed voice. “But I know how you feel.”

“I doubt that,” Helena murmured as her breath fogged the glass. She felt the familiar ache in the center of her chest when she thought of Barbara, that nameless emotion that could sneak up on her and nearly squeeze her heart into arrest. 

“Do you know what it would do to me if something happened to you, and I couldn’t stop it because I’m in this damn chair?”

Helena turned to look at her. “I don’t give a damn that you’re in that chair.” Her voice was rougher than she intended. “You take care of something far more important than my life, Barbara. Even if I died tomorrow, you’d still have that one thing safe.”

The older woman frowned in confusion.

“You have my soul. And I know you would die yourself to save it.” Helena swallowed hard when she met the wide, stunned green eyes with her own. The situation was too intense, brought too many frightening emotions to the surface. Jerking into motion, Helena grabbed her jacket off a nearby chair and slipped it on. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Helena, wait…” Barbara managed, but her friend walked out onto the balcony and leapt out into the darkness.

Barbara took an unsteady breath. Twice tonight her younger friend had stunned her into stupefied silence. Her eyes dipped to her hands.

You have my soul…

She closed her hands into fists. A sweet ache filled her chest and for just a moment she surrendered to it, letting it consume her completely. It was a feeling she never gave a name to, never looked at too closely. 

Reluctantly, Barbara tamped the feeling back into the lonely little hole it lived in inside her as she put away the medical supplies and closed the kit. When everything was in its proper place, she glanced around the empty room once more before turning off the light and heading for bed…

…never seeing Helena crouched on the ledge across the street, watching her through her tears.


	3. Chapter 3

“So you really are a teacher.”

The mid-afternoon sun poured through the windows lining one wall of Barbara’s English class. Dust motes floated lazily in the warmth, caught and held by musty air thick with chalk dust. The redhead looked up from the papers she’d been grading. Nicole Kincaid stood in her doorway, her long tapered hands tucked into the pockets of her faded jeans. She wore a figure-hugging brown sweater and brown leather jacket, her blonde hair now dry and hanging in loose curls.

Barbara felt the same twitch of attraction deep in her belly that she had last night. She tried to brush it off by tunneling her hands through her hair. “Dr. Kincaid. This is a nice surprise.”

“Just Kincaid. Or Nick,” the surgeon offered before pushing off the wall and wandering into the classroom. Her blue eyes skimmed over the literary posters and a smile tugged at her lips. “I never did get into Shakespeare.” She brushed a smudge of chalk dust off the nearest portrait.

Barbara licked her lips and smiled. “Obviously. That’s Hemingway.”

“Right.” Nick swung to look at her then shrugged. “Told ya.”

Barbara snorted. “I guess you’re more a math and science kind of girl.”

“Bet you hate both,” Nick guessed.

“Actually, I love both. I dabble in them from time to time. You know, balancing the checkbook. Identifying some evolved object in a Tupperware container in the fridge…”

Nick’s smile widened and Barbara felt her heart trip in reaction.

“Why do I get the feeling that’s not entirely true?”

The redhead shrugged. “I can’t imagine.” She set her pen down and leaned back, welcoming the distraction. Her thoughts had been scattered and as much as the papers had needed grading, Barbara was finding it impossible to focus on them instead of her worried thoughts of Helena. “So what can I do for you?”

Nick crossed her arms and leaned against the wall. “Draco bothered you today?”

“No. I don’t expect he will, either.” Barbara watched her. “I was going to call you tonight. To see if you wanted to finish our conversation.”

“Is dinner involved?”

Barbara hesitated. “Sure. If you want it to be,” she said slowly, wondering if she should reschedule in the event Helena might want to talk about the heavy conversation they’d shared last night. Barbara discarded the idea as soon as she thought of it. As brave as Helena was at taking on people twice her size in a fight, her friend was a complete coward when it came to handling her own feelings. Chances were excellent Helena wouldn’t show for anything but her sweep, and she would do that by checking in via comm-link.

“Why not? Girl has to eat.” Nick glanced around the room again before letting her eyes rest on Barbara. “I have to admit, I’m curious about you.”

Barbara tried to pretend like her ego didn’t inflate slightly at the comment. “Why?”

“You threaten bad guys by night, teach high school English by day.” Nick came closer and crouched next to Barbara’s wheelchair, running her fingers over some of the components. “And I’ve never seen a chair like this. You moved away from the table last night just by thinking about it. Didn’t you?”

Green eyes gazed down into blue. “You think I’m psychic or something?” Barbara teased playfully, ignoring the curiosity she could see in Kincaid’s expressive eyes.

“Or something,” Nick answered with a crooked smile.

“Hey, Barbara. Let’s bolt. I’ve had enough of… Oh, sorry.” Dinah pulled up short as she rounded the corner to find the woman in her visions from the night before kneeling on the floor next to Barbara. “I uh…”

Nick stood. “Is this your daughter?”

Barbara’s eyebrows elevated at the question. Sometimes she felt like she played mother hen to Dinah and Helena but she was rarely accused of the genetic equivalent. “I’m her legal guardian.”

“Dinah,” the blonde supplied but made no move toward the other woman. The last thing she wanted was a repeat performance of last night. She gave the newcomer the once over, admitting to herself that Kincaid was attractive. She even picked up on a subtle vibe that the doctor might feel the same way about Barbara.

“Hi, Dinah, I’m Nick.” She didn’t make a move to approach the girl, sensing Dinah didn’t want to be touched.

“Nice to meet you,” Dinah said weakly. An odd feeling of betrayal manifested in the middle of her chest along with a fierce urge to protect the one woman missing from this moment. “You talk to Helena today?” she blurted at Barbara.

Barbara blinked. “No. Why?”

“No reason. Just asking.” Dinah looked from one woman to the other. She didn’t think she could hang around and watch them flirt. “Actually, do you mind if I head to the library for a few hours? I need to get some study time in.”

“I thought you wanted to bolt,” Barbara replied. She sensed something going on with her young charge but damned if she knew what it was.

“Nah. I’ll just catch up on my trig. I’ll ride the subway home.”

“Are you sure?” Barbara asked, not really liking the idea.

“Yeah.” Dinah’s gaze darted to Kincaid and away again. “See you guys around.” Spinning on her heel, she rounded the corner and all but fled.

Barbara suspected the reason for Dinah’s departure and her face heated slightly. She scratched the bridge of her nose, hoping to hide her blush.

“High strung little thing,” Nick drawled with a hint of a smile.

“Teenagers,” Barbara muttered as if that explained everything with a shake of her head. “Well, it looks like I’m free now if you’d like to get a head start on the dinner rush.”

“Absolutely.”

****

“Barbara?” Helena cleared her throat as her voice nearly cracked under the weight of her nerves. She frowned as she stepped off the elevator and looked around. The clock tower was eerily silent save for the low level hum of the computer equipment. There was none of Dinah’s music pumping out of her room. No familiar whirl of servos as Barbara moved about in her chair. No patter of keystrokes as her friend tracked down the latest criminal she set her sights on.

“Ms. Helena.”

The brunette nearly leapt out of her skin. Glancing to her right, she spied Alfred emerging from the kitchen. She wondered if he’d ever been a superhero before becoming a butler. He sure has hell had the stealth skills for it. “Alfred.”

“I didn’t mean to startle you,” he stated calmly but there was a little smirk on his lips that did not go unnoticed.

“No big deal,” she muttered as she came down the steps. “Where is everybody?” Glancing at her watch, Helena frowned again. It was almost seven. The sun was now nothing more than a sliver of red on the horizon, no longer bright enough to bathe the tower in even the faintest glow.

“Miss Dinah will be home momentarily. She is picking up pizza.”

“Oh. Sweet.” The idea of pizza sounded pretty appealing actually. “Where’s Barbara?” Helena asked as she laced her fingers together to keep them from fidgeting. It had taken damn near everything she had to make herself come to the clock tower tonight, but something felt like it had shifted between her and Barbara the night before, something fundamental. Helena had been compelled to return, if only to see the green eyes she couldn’t seem to get out of her head lately.

“Ms. Barbara is having dinner with someone. She said she’d be in by eight.”

Helena’s full attention diverted from the setting sun onto Alfred. “Who is she having dinner with?”

“I did not ask and she did not say.”

“I thought she wanted to do a sweep tonight,” Helena muttered, feeling jilted. Not that Barbara had any reason to suspect she’d show in person tonight. Her track record was a little weak in that regard. Helena suspected whom Barbara was having dinner with and she was just as suspicious that Alfred was lying about it.

“Ms. Barbara didn’t expect you tonight,” Alfred told her without preamble.

“Course not. I pour my heart out once in a blue moon then avoid people until the next one,” Helena groused, more frustrated with herself than Barbara.

“You poured your heart out to Ms. Barbara?” Alfred inquired innocently.

Helena narrowed her eyes at him. “Once in a blue moon, Alfred,” she reminded him. “And you missed the event last night.”

“Shame,” he said blithely.

Helena sighed, her gaze drawn to the empty Delphi terminal. “So Barbara gets to have a social life while I sit on my tail around here?” She tried to come off like she was joking but she felt her effort fall flat.

“Ms. Barbara so rarely goes out, Ms. Helena. I would think you would be pleased.” The butler’s voice easily carried a stern note of disapproval, but there was an underlying tone of understanding.

Helena winced. So he was right. It still didn’t mean she had to like it. “Whatever,” she answered lamely then rolled her eyes at how pathetically childish she sounded as she turned away from him.

The elevator doors opened and Dinah stepped out, balancing two pizza boxes, her book bag, and a six-pack of soda. Fearing for the life of her dinner, Helena bounded up the steps and intercepted the boxes and cans before they hit the floor.

Dinah glanced up, startled to see Helena seemingly materializing in front of her. “Oh. Hey.”

“Hey, yourself.” Helena sniffed the boxes. “These have olives on them?”

“One of them does. I learned my lesson the last time.”

Helena grinned, feeling her mood lightening a little.

Dinah glanced around. Noting Alfred, she gave him a wide grin. “Hi, Alfred.”

“Miss Dinah.” He bowed his head in her direction.

“You staying for pizza?”

“I would be delighted.”

“Cool.” The teenager followed Helena back down the steps and they all wandered into the kitchen. “So Barbara isn’t home, yet?”

“She plans to be home by eight.” Alfred went to a cupboard and pulled down three plates.

“Eight? Jeez, they’ve been together since four.”

Helena had decided to start without waiting on something as trivial as plates or napkins. Her first slice paused halfway between her mouth and the table. “Who is she with?” The busted expression on Dinah’s face told the brunette all she needed to know. Her appetite fading, she still forced herself to take a bite, burning the roof of her mouth in the process.

“Dr. Kincaid stopped by,” Dinah answered in a subdued voice. “They went to get a bite to eat.”

“Three hours ago,” Helena muttered as she chewed mechanically.

“How did she seem?” Alfred asked as he methodically cut up his cheese and pepperoni.

“Who, Barbara?” Dinah asked, confused.

“Dr. Kincaid. Ms. Barbara seems to like her but she did not elaborate.”

Helena cocked her head at the butler. “I thought you didn’t know who she was with?” she accused.

Alfred inserted a perfect square of pizza into his mouth and chewed silently.

“She seemed nice,” Dinah answered simply.

“Nice?” Both Helena and Alfred intoned in nearly the same inflection. They exchanged looks.

“Nice,” Dinah replied before stuffing another bite of pizza in her mouth, determined not to add anything more on the subject.

The elevator doors opened and they all turned their attention toward the sound. Barbara wheeled out. Alone, Helena gratefully noticed. The redhead gave them all a wide smile.

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” Barbara said as she pulled up next to the table.

Helena tried not to frown. She hadn’t seen Barbara wearing a smile like that since Wade asked her out the first time. Her stomach soured and she swallowed before setting her slice of pizza down.

“Actually I just got here with dinner,” Dinah chimed in before sipping from her soda.

“Great. I’m going to go change. I’ll be back in a few minutes. You up for a sweep tonight?” Green eyes cut to Helena and studied her intently.

The brunette paused, caught in that green regard. “Sure,” Helena said when she remembered how to speak. Her eyes tracked Barbara’s progress until her friend disappeared around the corner. She itched to follow. To ask the bevy of questions crowding onto her tongue…

“Looks like Ms. Barbara has found a new friend,” Alfred commented casually before forking a piece of pepperoni into his mouth.

Jealousy, cold and tight, settled in the center of Helena’s belly. She knew what she was feeling and she was mad at herself for feeling it. With a disgusted sigh, she shoved her plate away. Her gaze met Dinah’s and she gave her a wry, lopsided smile. “I’ll be out on the balcony.”

Dinah watched her go. When the doors had closed behind her she glanced at the doorway to Barbara’s room.

“Don’t get involved,” Alfred advised.

Dinah gave him a sharp look. “Don’t get involved in what?”

“Between what’s going on between Ms. Helena and Ms. Barbara.”

Dinah’s eyes widened in surprise. “You know?”

The butler gave her a coy smile. “They have to figure things out for themselves.”

“Is there something to figure out?” Dinah asked. “I mean… Helena telegraphs her feelings like an air raid siren. I don’t have to be psychic to hear them…”

“But Ms. Barbara reveals nothing.”

“Exactly,” Dinah agreed, impressed with his observation skills and pleased to have an ally in all this. “Sometimes I think… that maybe…”

“She reciprocates Ms. Helena’s feelings?”

“Alfred,” Dinah lowered her voice. “Something is happening with this Kincaid person. I’m worried Helena is going to get hurt.”

“Or maybe this will be the final push she needs to face her feelings.”

“Maybe,” Dinah allowed, but she still had a very bad feeling about the way things seemed to be developing between Barbara and Kincaid.

“Have you seen something to tell you otherwise?” Alfred asked before sipping primly from the straw in his soda.

Dinah shook her head. “No. Something has been gnawing at me the past week, though. I can’t put my finger on it.” She nibbled a piece of mozzarella off her thumb.

“Explain.”

The teenager shrugged. “Have you ever had a funny feeling that something bad was going to happen?”

Alfred watched her with a worried frown. When Dinah got one of her “feelings” there was usually something to be concerned about. “Have you spoken with Ms. Barbara?”

“No,” Dinah said again. “I’m not sure what to tell her.”

“Do you believe this bad feeling you are having pertains to Dr. Kincaid?”

Dinah looked up at him, their dinner momentarily forgotten. She could hear Barbara moving around in her room and knew her mentor would be joining them soon. Her eyes cut to Helena who was sitting on the edge of the balcony. “I don’t know,” she finally replied. “I keep having these dreams. I had them before Barbara even met Kincaid. They don’t make sense. They’re mostly just shadows and emotions.”

“But they frighten you,” Alfred observed when she met his gaze again.

“Yeah,” she said softly. “I feel like I’m going to lose something. Something important.”

“Did you save me a piece?” Barbara rolled into the room. She’d changed into jeans and a navy blue hoodie.

“I thought you were having dinner with Dr. Kincaid?” Dinah asked, grateful for the distraction.

“That was hours ago. Then we went for a walk down by the park. Chatted a little.” Barbara picked up a piece of Helena’s favorite pizza and took a healthy bite. “It’s cold out there. I worked up an appetite, I guess.” She looked around, wondering where Helena had wandered off. She’d changed quickly, afraid Helena would leave before she had the chance to talk to her. Barbara had been pleasantly surprised to see her when she’d arrived, feeling some tension in her body unwind at the sight of her familiar features. She caught sight of the woman in question out on the balcony. “What is she doing out there?”

“Brooding, I suspect,” Alfred murmured with a hint of playfulness to his voice. “This is Ms. Helena we’re talking about.”

Barbara gave Alfred an amused look but then her gaze returned to Helena’s lonely figure. Something about the sight clutched her heart and squeezed.

“So what did you talk about?”

“Hmm?” Barbara glanced back at Dinah before taking another bite of her pizza, her gaze drawn back to Helena automatically.

“You and the doctor. What did you talk about?” Dinah asked.

Barbara felt a slight blush rise to her cheeks when she realized why Dinah was asking. The girl had picked up on her attraction and now assumed that Barbara was interested in pursuing the doctor. “Just stuff. Nothing major.”

“She married?”

“Dinah.” There was no mistaking the hint of warning in Barbara’s tone.

“Just asking. She’s really pretty.”

“I don’t know if she’s married or not. It didn’t come up.” Barbara grabbed a soda then moved away from the table no longer comfortable with the direction the conversation was taking. She wheeled over to the Delphi terminal, set her soda down, and booted up the system.

“So what’s on tap tonight?”

The sudden husky voice next to Barbara’s right ear made her jump. She turned her head and came face to face with a smirking Helena. The brunette winked before sauntering back toward the kitchen table and finishing her slice of pizza. Barbara shook her head, amazed as always how stealthy the younger woman could be.

Dinah noted that Helena had regained some of her composure as Helena sipped her soda. The teenager gave Alfred a look, which he answered with a dignified shrug.

Helena finally returned to Barbara before leaning over her, resting both her hands on the armrests of the redhead’s chair. “So,” she drawled. “Where do you want me?”

Barbara tipped her head back. She was picking up on something odd with Helena’s mood but couldn’t puzzle out what it was. “Looks like there’s a lot of activity tonight.” Her gaze skimmed the angles of Helena’s face at close range. “Where do you want to be?”

Helena ducked her head and looked down into her friend’s upturned features. She couldn’t help it. She smiled at that beautiful face looking up at her with such open trust. With a sigh, she tore her gaze away and focused it on the screen. “Looks like a robbery in progress three blocks from here. Might as well start with that.” Reaching up, Helena activated the communications link on her necklace.

“Be careful,” Barbara told her as the brunette moved toward the balcony.

“Aren’t I always?” Helena called back playfully over her shoulder before diving off the balcony and into the shadows below.

“No,” Barbara murmured. “I wish you were, though.”

“I’ve got studying to do,” Dinah said as she gathered a few pieces of pizza on her plate. She hefted her backpack and gave Alfred a smile. “See you, Alfred.”

He nodded once, his gaze promising her they would speak more later.

“Call me if you need anything,” Dinah shouted down to Barbara as she took the steps up to her room two at a time.

Alfred came around the table and walked over to Barbara. He stared at the tracking dot that represented Helena’s moving figure. “She certainly travels quickly,” he commented.

Barbara smiled. “Practically flies,” she agreed with an edge of pride in her voice.

“So is she?”

Barbara frowned, not sure of the question. “What?”

“Dr. Kincaid. Is she as pretty as Dinah says?”

The blush was back. Barbara looked away and put the communications signal on mute so Helena wouldn’t hear the conversation. “Why are you asking?”

“Merely curious.”

Barbara narrowed her eyes at him. “Alfred…”

“Yes?”

“I like men.”

He smiled knowingly. “If you say so, Ms. Barbara.” He walked away and began to pick up after their meal. He could feel Barbara Gordon’s eyes on his back, though. Almost as much as he could sense her confusion.


	4. Chapter 4

The shadows stretched out like long, demonic fingers across the warehouse floor. Shot through with the reflection of blinking neon lights, there was something hellish about the empty, cavernous space. Draco liked it that way.

His oak desk and chair were the only pieces of furniture in the room. They were back in the far right corner, giving him a view of everything and the possibility of nothing but bare walls at his back. Long since gone, the smell of packing crates and fish still hung thick in the air even after more than five years of only cold wind and dust inhabiting the space. Outside, his guards patrolled the perimeter, keeping their eyes open for his enemies and allies alike.

Draco leaned back in his chair as he raked a well-manicured hand through his highlighted hair. He was model pretty and he knew it, using his looks to lure young, unsuspecting women into his bed. He seemed like the all American boy. It always took them by surprise in those final moments when they realized the devil had the face of an angel.

The computer continued to run its search and he watched dispassionately as images and information scrolled across his screens. His blue eyes were filled with visions of Barbara Gordon, from high school yearbook photos, to images of her years as a gymnast, to the articles expounding on the tragedy of her shooting. Her life played out before him in print and pictures, but he knew he was only seeing what he was allowed to see.

No matter how deep he hacked, Draco knew there was so much more to Barbara Gordon than he would ever find. She’d scared him. And no one… no one had ever had that pleasure.

He wasn’t sure if he was aroused by the notion or infuriated by it. Barbara Gordon made him feel. Feel in a way nothing had for a long time. Killing had lost its thrill. It was no longer enough to buy the adrenaline rushes he craved. He’d been feeling empty, hollow. But Gordon… Gordon fascinated him. She’d awoken his competitive spirit and he wanted to thank her for it. To shower her in money. To bed her till she begged for mercy. Then he would choke the life from her pretty throat.

Draco rubbed his bottom lip with his thumb as he considered the possibilities. He’d have Barbara Gordon, but he’d eliminate the people she cared about first. In the end, he would be all she had left.

****

The roof was wet beneath Helena’s boots. She could smell more rain in the air as she stared down at the damp streets of New Gotham from her perch amongst the skyscrapers. The evening had started busy, but it had gotten quieter with each passing hour until criminal activity had all but ceased. Only a few muggings and a lame attempt at a carjacking interrupted what was on its way to being a dull night. She and Barbara barely spoke, neither sure what to say to one another.

The rain and silence suited Helena’s mood. Even though she craved the sound of Barbara’s voice purring in her ear, she wasn’t ready to share any more than she had last night. That had been too much already. So rather than speak and risk wading into the thorny territory of her feelings, Helena watched the city below and listened to the water drip around her. It was strangely peaceful, and for once, Helena hoped an uncomplicated night would stay that way.

“You’re quiet,” Barbara’s voice murmured, sliding down Helena’s hearing and warming her unexpectedly. Barbara had one of those voices that could make Helena’s body hot all over with a simple hello. 

Helena’s lips quirked as she sighed. Barbara always seemed to be able to read her mind, and then force her to do the opposite of what she wanted to do. “Something wrong with that?” Helena drawled in return.

“Not wrong.” Barbara kept her voice low. “Just… unusual.”

“Am I boring you?”

There was a pause and Helena could hear a smile in Barbara’s voice when she replied. “I should be so lucky.”

They were quiet a moment.

“So tell me about this Kincaid person,” Helena finally said, biting the proverbial bullet.

“What do you want to know?” Barbara asked guardedly.

“What’s she look like?” Helena tried to keep her voice light, disinterested. She wondered if Barbara thought she’d failed as miserably as she did.

“Helena…”

“I’m standing on a wet roof, waiting for some idiot to do something idiotic on a rainy and windy Thursday night. Humor me.” Helena put her hands on her hips, tossing her head to the side to twitch a wet lock of black hair away from her eyes. 

“She’s… about five foot six. Blonde hair. Sky blue eyes,” Barbara said slowly.

“Sky blue eyes?” Helena almost choked on the description. “Jesus, Barbara.”

“That’s what color they are,” Barbara replied defensively.

“You sound like a romance novel.” Helena knew she was being harsh, but jealousy was swimming thick and heavy through her veins, clawing at the inside of her chest. “Fucking green-eyed monster,” she whispered.

“What?”

“Nothing,” Helena answered quickly, rolling her eyes at herself.

“I think you’d like her, actually,” Barbara said after a moment. “You two remind me of each other a bit.”

“Smart? Beautiful? Badass?” Helena rattled off the list with a hint of humor, hoping to make up for her earlier tone.

“Modest,” Barbara added sarcastically for good measure.

Helena smiled. “What are you saying?”

“You…” Barbara sighed but Helena knew she wasn’t mad. “I swear… you live to push my buttons.”

Helen bit her lip to stifle the fierce grin that wanted to stretch across her features. “You have buttons? The stoic and staid Oracle has buttons other than those on her trusty keyboard and little teacher-inspired cardigans?”

“You are so going to get it when you get back here.”

“Promises, promises,” Helena teased, but she let herself imagine some delicious possibilities.

“Damn.” Barbara’s voice lost its humor in an instant.

“What’s wrong?”

“At my school. Someone tripped my silent alarm.”

“You think it’s Draco?” Helena asked, already moving, her long legs helping her jump from building to building with ease.

“I thought I warned the bastard off. Guess he changed his mind.”

“Then I’ll just have to change it back,” Helena announced before leaping off a ledge and into the darkness below.   
****

The wind pushed against the glass of the hotel window, whistling a little like a bad Halloween record as it tried to creep in around the edges. Nick glared at the image of the city beyond, irritated that the sound was managing to give her the creeps.

With a sigh, she tossed the covers off and got to her feet. It was nearing three in the morning and obviously if sleep were going to grace her with its embrace it would have done so already. Quickly changing into a pair of faded jeans and a red, ribbed sweater, she decided she would satisfy a little of her curiosity about Draco and Barbara Gordon in one fell swoop. She stuffed her feet into a pair of black boots and slipped on her leather jacket before heading off into the night.

The wind whipped harder once she was out in it. Nick kept her head down as she walked the streets, winding her way toward Barbara Gordon’s school. It took fifteen minutes, five of which were spent retracing her steps when she had gotten lost. New Gotham was all beautiful architecture and warm sunlight during the day, but at night it was a maze of shadows, concrete and alleys.

Finally, Nick was on the roof, frowning at the low rent security system standing between her and what she wanted to know. Getting past it took far less time than her walk. Nick dropped from the skylight and landed with a soft bang on a cafeteria table. She crouched and waited, wondering if some bumbling security guard would manifest at the sound.

No one did.

With a hop, Nick dropped to the floor and gave her surroundings the once over. The building was old but well-maintained. An inner city school built probably sometime in the fifties with most of the décor appearing to have originated in the same era. Why did Gordon work here? She had money. If teaching meant that much to her she could pursue it in a nice private school somewhere. Yet she chose this place… this life. Gordon was either very admirable or very suspicious.

Nick quietly made her way down a carpeted hall past rows and rows of lockers. She had hated high school. Much smarter than the other kids, she had always been an outcast, ridiculed for having a brain. She was always picked last at dodge ball. At basketball. At everything.

She’d kept to herself and had been mostly content to do so, only rearing her head when an underdog worse off than her needed defending. That was one thing she and Gordon seemed to have in common. That and a hatred for Draco.

They had talked for hours about the man. About the pall his “business” had cast over the city. About what he had done to her sister.

Nick swallowed at the sudden tightness in her throat. Barbara had understood her feelings of impotent rage in a way that told Nick the redhead had been in her shoes, and proverbially walked far more than a mile in them.

When she reached the main office, a small set of lock picks easily managed the door. She gripped the knob and turned, expecting musty air and the scent of old wood.

She wasn’t disappointed, but she got a healthy lungful of both as she sucked in a surprised breath as some grabbed her before flinging her with negligent ease into a wall. Nick hit hard enough to make her teeth rattle. Her hands came up as she saw a figure lunging at her. They closed on leather, and she smelled sweat a second before a solid fist struck her face, nearly taking her down.

Her attacker was no frat boy this time.

Nick felt power in the blow the likes of which she’d never encountered. She kicked out, catching her attacker in the stomach and sending them crashing into the receptionist’s desk. A phone and files went flying, clattering onto the floor. The steady hum of a dial tone joined jerky breaths as Nick launched over the desk and tried to gain the upper hand.

They tangled. As they struggled, she realized she was fighting with another woman when her hand inadvertently closed over a sensitive part of anatomy. Irrationally, she felt the urge to apologize.

Before she could say a word, she was thrown toward the principal’s office, hitting the window and shattering it into hundreds of shards. The glass crunched under her back as hands clutched her lapels, jerking her off the floor and slamming her back into the door. Nick tasted blood as her hands searched frantically for a weapon. Finding a phone, she grabbed it and swung hard, hearing a yelp for her effort. The grip on her loosened and Nick shoved her attacker away.

Moonlight filtering in through the windows revealed a beautiful face with a pair of inhuman eyes glittering back at her. Nick went still in shock, trying to process what she was seeing. “Wait!” she shouted when the woman started for her again. “I’m not looking for trouble.”

“Found it anyway,” the woman purred. “You part of Draco’s gang? Did you think you could come in and hide some more drugs in here?”

Nick edged back, wincing as her palms were sliced on the shards of glass. She reached up and grabbed a corner of the desk, easing herself up into a standing position. “I don’t work for Draco,” she answered, her voice as cold and dark as the night outside. “I thought you did.”

Those cat-like eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “Then why are you breaking into this school at three in the morning?”

“Why are you protecting it?” Nick wiped at the trickle of blood she could feel at the corner of her mouth.

Her attacker cocked her head. “Who are you?”

“You first,” Nick answered.

Again those eyes studied her but no longer with predatory intent. Suddenly they widened and black morphed into blue. “You’re Kincaid.”

Nick blinked, hearing relief and something like disgust in the other woman’s voice. 

The dark haired woman tilted her head again as if she were listening to a voice only she could hear. “Barbara is telling me not to kill you.” She sounded disappointed.

Nick sat down on a desk as she warily regarded the other woman. “Barbara Gordon?” She noticed the interesting necklace around the brunette’s neck, the matching earrings. A comlink? “You’re talking to Barbara?”

“She’s talking. I’m listening.” Helena strode toward the other woman, taking in her pale blue eyes and fair skin. She was pretty, damn it. And one scrappy as hell fighter, she admitted. Helena suspected the other woman was meta, and wondered if Kincaid had any clue about her own powers. “What are you doing here?”

“Having a look around. I wanted to know how Draco was getting his drugs in. What are you doing here?”

Helena smiled. “Making sure you weren’t one of Draco’s men. You tripped a hidden alarm.”

Nick swallowed. “You know my name…” She let the suggestion fade off into the darkness, watching the stranger curiously.

“You can call me Huntress,” Helena answered, smirking a little as she heard Barbara sigh in her ear.

“Huntress?” Nick got unsteadily to her feet. “What is it with this town? All these people running around with capes, gadgets, and silly little nicknames.”

“Silly little nicknames?” Helena growled. She ignored Barbara’s quiet ‘Oh boy’ murmured in her ear. “Let me tell you something, Doc,” Helena continued. “Our code names protect our real identities… protect the people we love from being hunted down by the people we try to stop.” She didn’t believe what she was saying for a second and had argued with Barbara countless times about it, but she wasn’t about to let this woman with the sky blue eyes come along and trash talk her chosen profession.

“People like the Riddler? The Penguin? I’ve been reading up on New Gotham. Your city is like a freaking circus.”

“Would that make me one of the freaks?” Helena asked, her voice low and lethal.

Nick hesitated. “I don’t know,” she said evenly. “What’s with the eyes?”

“The same thing that’s with your strength,” Helena replied. She was aware of Barbara’s sudden silence on the other end of their connection. “I’m super strong,” Helena admitted with no trace of vanity. “A lot of metas are. And you went toe to toe with me for at least a few seconds there.”

“You think I’m like you?” Nick blurted. She shook her head. “Not even close.”

“Hmm.” Helena started to say more, but a noise in the hallway made them both turn.

“Cops?” Nick mouthed.

Helena’s eyes turned to slits again. She took a breath, smelling the stench of drugs on the new intruder. She shook her head once before moving with purpose toward the hallway, feeling Kincaid fall in step behind her.

She found him planting a stash in a freshman locker and made a note of the number, determined to come back for the drugs later. Helena continued to stay back, watching to see what he would do next. He moved surely about the building, like a man who knew where he was going. Like he’d walked these halls a hundred times before. A student? A teacher? Or just a pusher dropping off his latest batch of poison?

He planted bundles in four more lockers. Helena mentally filed away their locations. She’d have Barbara run a search on the students. Clearly they were dealing, and Helena wanted to wring their stupid, young little necks.

Cold anger twisted in Helena’s guts as she followed, barely aware of Kincaid’s presence behind her. She tracked him at a safe distance, making sure he left nothing else for the students. When he detoured toward the English department, however, her cold anger went white hot.

“Wait here,” she warned Kincaid with a harsh whisper. Without waiting for a reply, Helena went after him. 

Nick warred with herself. Stay or go? She started to backtrack toward the drugs, determined to keep them out of the hands of unsuspecting and foolish students. She’d made it down three rows of lockers, recovering one stash along the way, when unease wound through her guts and she stopped. Pure instinct had her spinning and bolting the way she’d come, a nameless fear racing up from her feet and clutching like a drowning man at her heart. 

****

The intruder was in Barbara’s classroom. Helena waited, her whole body twitching, for him to emerge. It was so hard to stay still when she wanted to do nothing but attack, but she was gaining vital intel about Draco’s operation inside the school. Instead of shutting down one bastard, maybe she could get them all.

“He’s in your room, Babs,” Helena spoke directly to the redhead on the other end of the link for the first time since entering the building.

A muffled curse was her response.

“Don’t go in. Let’s call the police, have them do a sweep.” Barbara began to type out a message to send off to the authorities. An email from Oracle usually sent them running.

“I’m just going to take a quick look,” Helena replied.

“Where is Kincaid?”

“I told her to stay put.”

“That’s great advice, why don’t you listen to it?” Barbara drawled as she hit send.

Despite the circumstances, Helena smiled. She flattened against the nearest wall, blending with the shadows. “She’s pretty. I see why she’s got you hot and bothered.”

Back at the clock tower, Barbara’s head came up and she sighed. “Helena…”

“Just making an observation,” Helena answered easily, even though she was using her flippant remarks to hide the pain she was in. Aside from having a hell of a right hook, seeing her competition for Barbara’s affections in the flesh had been a blow to her ego as well.

Helena went silent as the intruder emerged, closing the door to the classroom quietly before he sprinted away.

“He’s gone. I’m going to go have a look.”

“Hel…”

“I’m going to stick my head in the door. That’s all. I promise,” she said with a hint of exasperation. “I want to make sure the police don’t find a stash of drugs in there. Draco could be setting you up.”

“Why don’t we let Reese handle this? The first patrol car is pulling up at the front door now.”

“Reese is as pretty as a picture but as a dumb as rock. Just give me a second.” Helena moved to the door. With a quick glance down the hall, she made sure she was alone before turning the knob.

Then all she knew was chaos and pain. Followed by nothing at all.


	5. Chapter 5

A cold mist coated her features, the chill drawing Nick up out of blackness and into fire and destruction. She gasped softly, wincing in pain at the weight of a locker pressing down on top of her. It had smashed into her during the explosion, knocking her through another door and into the unexpected shelter of a second classroom. With a determined push, she lifted it, feeling textbooks sliding around inside. A final heave sent it sideways, banging down onto the carpeted floor as she slowly got to her feet.

Above her, a portion of the roof was gone, letting either rain or spray from a fire hose drift down over her. She closed her eyes for a moment, trying to get her bearings, trying to remember where she was and what she’d been doing. Taking a deep breath, she noted that the air smelled of smoke and chalk, and she coughed weakly as both tickled her lungs.

She should have been dead. Nick knew that much as she wrestled loose a vague memory of a ball of fire hurtling concrete and metal toward her. She’d sensed the impending explosion on some level and had tried to get out of the way, but the force had been too swift and too violent. She looked down at the locker she’d just tossed aside, realizing that it might very well have saved her life.

The sound of sirens and fire were muted but still distinct beneath the ringing in her ears. Nick shook her head, feeling small pieces of debris tumble off her shoulders as she stumbled toward what was left of the hallway. When she saw the damage, everything else came rushing back.

“Huntress!” she called out, nearly tripping over a chunk of concrete the size of a bowling ball. Nick wiped at her face, noting that her fingers came away covered in damp plaster and blood. “Huntress!” she shouted again, her own voice sounding like it was underwater.

There was no way the other woman could have survived but Nick kept searching anyway, compelled for some reason to find her… if there was anything left to find.

Something metal winked at her in the low light, and Nick clambered toward it, crawling over another set of crushed lockers to retrieve it. It was a small bat, she realized, the one Huntress had been wearing around her neck.

One wing was coated with blood.

****

“Barbara!”

Her name slowly penetrated, and Barbara realized it was hardly the first time Dinah had said it. The teenager had pushed her away from the terminal and had a bruising grip on both her arms. Barbara shook her head, coming back to herself from the place her mind had fled to when she’d heard the explosion. She covered Dinah’s hands with her own, feeling the younger woman steady at the contact.

“God no,” she whispered, the truth of what she’d just heard settling over her.

Her gaze jerked to the Delphi and she stared in disbelief at Helena’s vital signs. There was no proof of life, only flat lines on every indicator. “No,” Barbara said again, an edge of anger tinting her voice this time. She shook her heard, unwilling to believe what all the evidence was telling her. If anyone could survive something like this it was Helena, and Barbara clung to that truth like a lifeline. 

“Tell me what to do,” Dinah begged. She’d been torn from her dreams moments before the explosion, rushing out of her room to warn Barbara a half second too late. The sound of the blast had reached her as she tumbled out onto the balcony, and the ensuing shriek from Helena’s commlink going offline had been earsplitting.

“Go to the school,” Barbara answered, her voice tight and strained. “My school…” The bomb had been in her classroom. Helena had taken the blast meant for her. Hands shaking, Barbara abruptly slid back to the terminal, snapping out of her shock and evading the grief that wanted to reach up and drag her under. Helena needed her. She refused to accept any other scenario. Reaching up, she touched her earpiece. “Helena? Helena, can you hear me?”

Barbara glanced behind her when she heard Dinah grabbing her jacket. She started to call out a warning but she kept it to herself, needing Dinah’s eyes and ears at the scene. For a moment, their gazes met in understanding, then the elevator doors closed between them and Dinah was gone.

“Helena,” Barbara said again when she was alone. She paused, drawing in a hurting breath and swallowing in an effort to steady her voice. She’d always known something like this could happen, that she could lose the other woman on the other side of the link, but now that she was in that moment, Barbara couldn’t accept it. Not Helena. Not now. Just the thought threatened to break her. “Don’t you dare,” she ordered the other woman. “Don’t you dare leave me. Do you hear me?”

There was no response, only a thickening silence that threatened Barbara’s sanity.

****

She couldn’t breathe.

Something heavy was on top of her, pressing uncomfortably on her lungs. Struggling to think past the high-pitched ringing drilling through her head, Helena couldn’t comprehend what her own senses were telling her. Her sight revealed debris above her, a familiar picture of Hemingway dangling torn and tattered a few inches from her face. She reached up awkwardly to push on it, hearing the paper crinkle as she realized by the texture that it was attached to a section of a wall. A concrete wall.

“What the hell,” Helena mumbled. She couldn’t remember anything about how she’d wound up in her current predicament, but she had a sneaking suspicion it would make a hell of a story.

Whatever had landed her in this mess, Helena knew she needed to get out of it. She started to move, barely shifting an inch, when she felt pain tear through her body. Gasping shallowly, Helena tried to coil in on herself but she was pinned. Weakly she flailed, trying in vain to move, trying to get away from the sudden fire that burned through every muscle and joint. She’d been hurt before, but nothing had ever hurt like this.

“Barbara…” A plea for help, the name sounded like it was torn from her throat. Helena closed her eyes and groaned, an image of red hair and green eyes swimming behind her eyelids. “Barbara,” she called out again, needing the comfort of the other woman’s voice.

There was only the incessant ringing and the distant sound of sirens for an answer.

“Always hated school,” Helena said through her teeth, grabbing the picture of Hemingway and ripping it off the wall. She figured Barbara would forgive her under the circumstances, and the attempt at humor had the strange effect of calming her nerves.

One hand dropped to her neck, her fingers searching in vain for the familiar bat symbol but only encountering cold, wet skin. Helena swallowed, tasting blood, ash, and plaster on the back of her tongue. Fear bloomed again when she realized she had no way to communicate. She was cut off. Buried alive. Adrenaline made her muddled mind sharpen, but the strength she’d always counted on to get her out of jams like this one had abandoned her.

“Barbara,” she whispered a third time, desperate to hear Barbara’s sure tones, terrified she would never hear her again. Barbara would know something had gone wrong. She would get help, Helena told herself.

Claustrophobia was creeping over her. She could hear her own gasps for breath, coming faster and shallower now. Helena pushed against the wall again, feeling something give if only slightly. Her hopes surged and she tried kicking out, hoping she would have better luck with her feet.

Blinding pain wrung a new cry from her, a low keening sound she’d never made before. Tears sprang to her eyes and Helena gasped hard, struggling for air as her body rebelled against the shrieking agony in her lower back. It ran like rivers of fire down her legs, and she nearly bit through her lip to hold back another scream as she tried to get away from the sensation, realizing with dawning horror that she couldn’t.

Then the pain disappeared as abruptly as it had started, and Helena was left shaking in the dark, a cold sweat coating her whole body. Unconsciousness threatened, a mercy she fought against with everything she had. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong. On some level, Helena knew if she yielded to that darkness without a fight, she would never see Barbara again.

Weakly, she lifted her head, managing to see her legs with her inhuman sight even in the dark. They were still there, she confirmed.

Even if she could no longer feel them.

Her head fell back against the carpet. She could feel herself bleeding out, a sticky heat pooling beneath her.

“Barbara…” Helena murmured one last time, closing her eyes and remembering the other woman’s healing touch on her body from the other night. She had always thought when the end came that she would have no regrets, but Helena found herself with one that brought fresh tears to her eyes.

She would have given anything to kiss Barbara goodbye.

****

Nick’s hands were bleeding but she didn’t care as she pawed at the concrete and metal she was certain was between her and Huntress. She glanced behind her, cursing New Gotham’s slow first responders, wondering why in the hell no one had found them yet. She’d been digging for ten minutes, desperate to find the other woman if only to confirm what she already knew. There was no way Huntress could have survived, but she had to be sure. She had to see the body with her own eyes before she could walk away. Nick owed Barbara that much.

“To your left.”

The sudden voice made Nick jump and she turned her head to see a blonde teenager appear through the gathering smoke at her side. For a moment, all she could do was stare, slowly comprehending that it was the skittish young girl she’d seen hours before in Barbara’s classroom.

“She’s to your left,” Dinah insisted, climbing over the debris in an effort to get to Helena. This close, she could feel her now, and Dinah clawed at the concrete, feeling Helena slipping away from them. “She’s still alive,” she murmured, but she sounded scared and unsure.

Nick wondered what she should say to that delusion. She wiped at her jaw, holding the truth back a couple of moments more when she realized the teen wasn’t talking to her. The same type of bat symbol Huntress had worn adorned the young girl’s neck, and Nick realized Barbara had sent reinforcements. Dinah, she remembered from one breath to the next. She wasn’t sure why she complied, but she did, shifting her focus to where Dinah indicated and starting to dig anew.

When they found Huntress a few minutes later, Nick’s gaze jerked to Dinah’s features, watching the horror and grief wash across them. She wanted to drag the teenager out of there, to keep her from seeing this, but Dinah moved closer rather than shying away. She knelt next to Huntress, her fingers drifting through the other woman’s short, matted hair.

“Helena,” Dinah whispered.

Nick eased in around her before gently laying her fingers against the injured woman’s throat. She could smell the sharp tang of blood overpowering the scents of smoke and concrete. Closing her eyes, she lowered her head. She’d had to tell one too many families over the years that their loved ones hadn’t made it off her table, but it never got any easier. Just as she started to speak the young girls name, to tell her she was sorry, life fluttered against her fingertips.

“Jesus,” Nick hissed, the rest of the cobwebs in her mind clearing as her instincts took over. “She has a pulse,” she announced in disbelief. “Move,” she ordered Dinah, sliding into a better position to assess Helena’s injuries.

Dinah complied, stumbling backward to give Nick room. “You can save her, right?”

Nick looked back, not sure how to answer that question. Had this been anyone else she would have thought it was impossible, but the woman at her feet was already defying the odds.

“Please,” Dinah begged.

Wiping at her burning eyes, Nick focused back on Helena. She had been battered to hell in the explosion, her clothing ripped and torn. Blood oozed from numerous gashes and scrapes. Carefully, Nick felt Helena’s torso, suspecting there had to be a fair amount of internal damage. Leaning closer, she could see the spreading pool of blood under the other woman. She spared a moment to wonder if she should move her when there was a loud bang from down the hall, something inside one of the other classrooms violently igniting.

They were out of time.

Nick reached down and ran her hand under the unconscious woman, feeling something sharp clip her fingers as she got to Helena’s lower back. She paused, swallowing hard when she got a good feel for how deep the object was wedged inside her patient. Helplessly she looked back at Dinah.

“What?” The teenager demanded, clearly sensing the doctor had found something alarming.

“There’s damage,” Nick said, trying to keep her tone clinical. “Her spine. If I move her…”

Dinah stared at Helena for a long moment. “Barbara…” she said softly. “What do we…?”

Nick watched as the young girl listened. Slowly, Dinah nodded her head, moving forward hesitantly. She looked intent and focused, but there was still fear and uncertainty in her eyes.

“We have to go. The police can’t find her here,” Dinah explained.

“She needs a hospital,” Nick argued, her blue eyes staring at the bat symbol as if she could see Barbara Gordon through it. “She’ll die without treatment.”

“She would rather die than be a lab rat,” Dinah promised her, even if the thought brought tears to her eyes. “She’s different. They won’t understand.”

“Dinah…” Nick tried to keep her tone calm.

“You’ll have to do it,” Dinah announced, her eyes piercing as they stared at her. She reached out suddenly, grabbing Nick’s wrist with a strength that surprised the older woman. She closed her eyes, willing her gift to work, to see what outcome awaited Helena before the coming dawn.

When her eyes opened again, the fear and uncertainty in them was gone, replaced by a steely determination. “You’ll do it,” the teen said again. “You can save her.”

****

Her spine.

Barbara kept hearing those two words over and over. Had she been able to pace, she knew she would have, her thoughts too chaotic for her to sit still, but she had little choice. With sudden violence, Barbara slammed her fists against the armrests of her chair, the device suddenly feeling like a prison rather than her freedom.

It wasn’t going to happen, Barbara told herself. Helena was going to live, and she was going to be soaring over the rooftops again in short order. Nothing less was acceptable.

Barbara watched the elevator doors, trying to prepare herself for what she’d see when Dinah arrived with Helena and the doctor in tow. She’d built a medical bay in their new clock tower, but even though it was stocked with all the essentials, Barbara had never imagined they would actually need it. Not for something like this. 

The doors suddenly opened and Barbara felt her breath catch as she saw the doctor. Nick almost looked like a ghost, her face and hair wet and smeared with plaster. Only the thin, angry lines of red that marred one cheek and her temple made her look human. Rolling forward, Barbara barked out an order, sending Nick to her left toward the medical bay. In her arms was Helena, hanging heavy and lifeless. The sight almost destroyed Barbara’s composure, but she held it together when she caught sight of Dinah stepping off the elevator behind the doctor. The teen looked rattled, her clothes stained with blood, but she moved with a determined stride as she followed Nick toward the medical bay. 

Barbara felt her stomach heave at the stench of blood, but she battled it down, determined not to be weak when Helena needed her at her best. She followed the doctor into the bay, watching as she laid Helena face down on the bed. That’s when the light reflected off the jagged piece of metal protruding from Helena’s back. Barbara swallowed hard, knowing exactly where it was lodged and what an injury like that could do to a person.

The bullet wound she’d suffered long ago seemed to spasm in empathy.

“Barbara,” Nick murmured. “This is crazy. I could have a head injury. I’m filthy. She needs…”

“She needs you,” Barbara countered before the other woman could finish. She felt Dinah drift closer, coming to stand in silent support behind her chair. “Dinah is right. She’s meta. She goes into a hospital and she’ll never come out of one.”

“At least she’ll be alive,” Nick fired back, frustrated that no one was taking her seriously.

“That’s not living. Not for her.” Barbara moved closer, taking in the gashes on Helena’s face and arms. She reached out, finding the younger woman’s hand and holding it. Helena’s fingers felt too cold, and Barbara instinctively brought them to her lips, kissing them gently in an effort to warm them. She looked up at Nick. “Just do your best. That’s all I can ask.”

“The injury to her spine…” Nick began, finally resigning herself to having to perform surgery under less than ideal circumstances.

“I’m the last person you need to explain a spinal injury to.” Barbara’s voice was calm and her eyes were clear when she met Nick’s gaze again. “Just do your best,” she repeated, her attention drawn back to the woman before her. “Helena will do the rest.”

Nick shook her head, deciding that all three of these women were crazy. She started to turn toward the sink, to at least wash her hands, when Helena let out a small sound of pain. Nick froze, having never truly expected the woman to regain consciousness.

“Hel?” Barbara called, inching closer and feeling Dinah’s hands come down on her shoulders. “Hel? Can you hear me?”

“Barbara…”

Nick watched, stunned, as Helena’s eyes slowly opened and stared at the woman next to her. Helena even managed the tiniest of smiles.

“Gonna… get to… baby me… now,” Helena teased, but her voice was weak and strained. She was clearly in pain and trying desperately not to show it.

“Damn right,” Barbara whispered back, not fooled for a moment but smiling back to keep up the pretense that everything was going to be okay. She let her free hand reach up to drift through Helena’s hair in an effort to comfort them both. 

“It’s… bad… isn’t it?” Helena asked as Nick busied herself at the sink, stripping off her ruined clothes and putting on a pair of scrubs.

Barbara swallowed, feeling Dinah’s hands tighten on her shoulders. “Yeah. It’s bad.”

“Barbara…” Helena closed her eyes, willing herself through sheer stubborn will to stay awake. “I can’t feel…” She took a shallow breath before meeting Barbara’s gaze again, grateful that she’d been given the chance to look into those eyes one more time.

“I know,” Barbara cut her off gently, her voice wavering.

“Think… you can… make me a set of… matching… wheels?” Helena joked weakly.

Barbara bit her lip, everything in her rebelling at the idea. “You won’t need them,” she promised.

Damp and smelling of soap, Nick came closer, kneeling next to Barbara so she could meet Helena’s eyes. There was fear in them, but she was watching Barbara with so much love and trust Nick almost felt like an intruder.

“There’s a lot of damage,” Nick explained to her, marveling that she was even able to talk to a patient in Helena’s condition.

“Just… put a band-aid… on it, Doc.” Helena squeezed Barbara’s hand as her eyes began to drift closed. “I’ll… do the rest.”

Nick glanced at Barbara, but the redhead’s eyes were only for her patient. She moved back a step as Barbara closed the few remaining inches, giving them a moment to say goodbye.

“Helena?” Barbara beckoned, trying not to panic when it took her friend a long time to open her eyes. “I love you,” she told her, needing to say the three words they both rarely spoke. Leaning forward, she let her lips brush Helena’s cheek, the idea that this could be their last moments together hitting her so hard she could barely breathe.

“Love you… too,” Helena slurred, surprising Barbara as her gaze briefly flicked to Dinah so the teen knew she was included. “Gotta… go,” she murmured, her eyelids fluttering.

“So long as you come back,” Barbara told her, breathing in blood, leather, and the familiar spicy scent of Helena’s skin. “Just come back to me,” she pleaded, the first hint of begging entering her voice.

“Always,” Helena said with a smile before she slipped into unconsciousness once more.


	6. Chapter 6

Helena had never looked so pale.

Her normal healthy tan was missing, her pallor ashy and marred by scrapes and scratches. Barbara gazed upon her with a mixture of relief and lingering horror, rolling up to Helena’s bedside so she could touch her, confirm for herself that Helena was still there. Monitors kept track of all of the unconscious woman’s vital signs, and Barbara took some comfort in the steady and strong readings they were reporting.

“I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Barbara turned her head and looked back at the doctor, wincing a little at how tired Nick appeared. She had showered and changed, Dinah having gone to fetch the other woman’s things from the hotel hours ago. The surgery had taken the rest of the night, all of the morning, and well into the afternoon, now the sun was setting, casting slanted rays of red and gold in through the door and across Helena’s bed. “You should get some sleep.”

Nick nodded but she came closer to Helena’s bed. Barbara had prepared the spare room for her, and Nick had to admit the accommodations were nicer than her five star hotel. “I’m about to,” she admitted, staring down at Barbara with painfully bloodshot eyes. “Just wanted to check on her one last time.” She sighed. “Your friend should be dead, Barbara. No human being should have survived those injuries.”

Swallowing, Barbara switched her focus back onto the woman before her. Helena smelled like her favorite soap and shampoo, the scents made all the more appealing mingled with the familiar scent of the younger woman’s skin. Barbara had cleaned her up as best as she was able after the surgery, her hands shaking as she’d avoided too many stitched wounds to count. Reaching up, Barbara let her fingers gently drift through Helena’s still damp and disheveled hair. The strands felt like silk against her skin. “I know,” she finally answered softly. She hoped Nick didn’t hear the faint quiver in her voice.

“You and the kid both called her meta. What is that?”

“I’ll tell you all about it later. It’s too long of a topic to discuss when you’re about to drop at my feet.”

Nick’s jaw bunched under the skin of her cheek. “The kid said I was just like her. Just like Helena.”

Barbara drew in a slow breath, having forgotten all about it in the chaos that had come after. “There are ways to… test that,” she admitted haltingly. “If you want me to.”

“I want to know what it is. You really think I’m going to sleep easy with that on my mind?”

Reluctantly turning her chair toward the doctor, Barbara leaned back and looked up at her steadily. “It’s not an insult, Nick. It’s a gift. Metas are the next step in the evolutionary chain. They have what would look like… powers… to the uneducated.”

“Powers?” Nick said weakly. “What kinds of powers?”

“They often tend to be considerably stronger, faster. Dinah can sense things… see things…”

“Psychic?” Nick asked in disbelief.

Barbara shrugged. “As good a term as any.” She held Nick’s gaze. “You saw it yourself. She knew where Helena was buried. That she was still alive. That you could save her.” Her voice softened toward the end and she knew gratitude was shining in her eyes when Nick looked away uncomfortably.

Nick snorted at the very idea. “Barbara…”

“May heal faster than your average human,” Barbara added knowingly. “Look at her, Nick,” she urged, dipping her head toward Helena. “You remember the gashes on her face when you brought her in. Look at them now.”

Nick did as she was told, shifting her attention off Barbara’s green eyes to gaze down on her patient with open curiosity. She frowned when she realized all the cuts had closed and were clearly healing at a rapid rate. She shook her head. “It’s not possible.”

“You’re seeing the evidence yourself. Something tells me you heal faster as well. Probably a fact that’s always bothered you… something you’ve hidden from everyone who knows you.”

“It’s not possible I’m… meta…” Nick clarified. “Wouldn’t I know?”

“I think you already do,” Barbara said gently. “I’m guessing given your relatively young age and your very esteemed status in the medical community that you learn at a voracious rate. You’ve already displayed impressive reflexes and strength in your fight with Helena, and I imagine that you’re more than aware of your abilities when it comes to protecting yourself.”

Nick watched her, saying nothing.

“You could have skills you don’t even know about.”

“Like what?” Nick asked uneasily.

“Some metas have the ability to freeze things with their touch. Black Canary had a sonic scream…”

“A sonic scream?” Nick asked with a shaky laugh. She shook her head, starting to wonder if Barbara wasn’t yanking her chain.

“Don’t knock it. It was damn impressive,” Barbara admitted, a fond smile of remembrance on her features. “It’s nothing to be afraid of, Nick.”

“You’re telling me I might be a freak,” the doctor argued. She went still when Barbara’s eyes glittered with anger.

“Helena isn’t a freak,” the redhead snarled protectively. “And neither is Dinah. They’re both more than most of us… I won’t have you thinking less of them or yourself.”

“And what about you?” Nick asked wearily. She jerked a hand at the clock tower just beyond the open bedroom door. “You’re clearly brilliant…”

Barbara shook her head. “I’m just a boring old human.” She looked down at Helena again, feeling her heart clench at how still she was. “We may have suffered similar injuries, but our fates will be different. Being meta is going to save her.”

Nick wasn’t so sure. “What the hell are you doing, Barbara?” she asked abruptly. “You’re a schoolteacher fighting crime with what? Superheroes?”

Barbara shrugged, ignoring the doctor’s snide tone. “I was one of them once. Even after everything, I’d do it again given the chance.” She carefully scooped up Helena’s hand and threaded their fingers together. “Someone has to fight back against men like Draco,” Barbara told her.

“And how many more of you have to wind up dead or in a wheelchair before you let the cops handle it?”

“Like you were going to let the police handle your sister’s death?” Barbara fired back. She shook her head. “And Helena is not going to share my fate.” She gripped one of the armrests with her free hand. “She is not going to be confined to one of these. You’ll see.”

Nick put her hand on the back of Barbara’s chair. “She’s not out of the woods yet,” she insisted. “The spinal injury…”

“She’ll be fine,” Barbara promised her, her voice full of so much conviction Nick almost believed her.

They stared at each other for a tense moment before Nick finally looked away. “I’d tell you to get some sleep, but something tells me you aren’t going to leave her side.”

Barbara sighed, acknowledging the truth of that. “I need to be here.”

Nodding, Nick turned to go, pausing at the door and putting her hand on the frame before casting one last look at Barbara. “Maybe…” she began, licking her lips nervously before continuing, “maybe you can perform those… tests… later?”

Offering an encouraging smile, Barbara nodded. “I’d be happy to.”

Barbara listened to the fading sounds of Nick’s footsteps. A door closed gently, and suddenly the clock tower was quiet. Too quiet.

Edging closer still, Barbara leaned forward and put her forehead against the edge of the bed. She took a deep, shaky breath, as unwanted tears sprang to her eyes and a muffled sob escaped. Then the damn broke and all the fear and terror she’d felt at the thought of losing Helena came rushing back. Finally left alone with her emotions, there was no choice but to let them all out, and Barbara quietly cried herself to sleep at Helena’s side.

****

Slipping from her room early the next morning, Dinah felt her heart leap in fright when she spied a long shadow moving across the balcony of the clock tower. She looked around for something to defend herself with, finally spying a small, metal sculpture on an end table. Grabbing it, she inched closer, watching as the shadow changed direction and headed for the doors. She flattened against the wall and braced herself, hefting her makeshift weapon high.

Swinging down with all her strength as the mystery figured walked by, Dinah felt her hand grabbed and her body twisted as she was jerked negligently around. The sculpture was torn from her hand as she lost her balance, stumbling and falling down in Barbara’s chair at the Delphi.

“Good morning to you, too, Miss Dinah,” Alfred greeted nonchalantly. He straightened his tie, the only outward sign he’d been rumpled by their encounter.

“Alfred!” Dinah scowled. “You scared the hell out of me!”

“Clearly,” the butler murmured before setting the sculpture back on a shelf. “I was just pruning the plants.”

Dinah shook her head and got to her feet, glancing at the door to Helena’s room.

“Still sleeping,” Alfred informed her. “Both of them.”

“Both?” Dinah asked, her curiosity kicking into overdrive.

“Go see for yourself.” Alfred turned toward the kitchen. “Breakfast will be ready in ten minutes. You might want to wake Miss Barbara and her guest.”

Dinah watched him go, feeling surly about her scare and Alfred’s easy defeat of her so-called defense of the tower. Rolling her eyes but feeling slightly mollified by the scent of pancakes and bacon, Dinah walked up the ramp toward Helena’s room. She peered inside cautiously, her breath catching in her chest when she saw what was waiting for her.

Clear blue eyes lost their glare when Helena saw her, softening a fraction as her lips lifted in a half smile. Barbara was beside her bed, her head resting on her elbows where she lay next to Helena’s pillow. Helena was taking advantage of the situation, her arm draped over Barbara’s shoulders as her fingers drifted lazily through brilliant red hair. The sun peered in through the blinds, bathing them both in golden tones.

“Hey,” Helena greeted casually, but her voice sounded weak and rough. “Do I smell bacon?”

Dinah stifled a laugh, pure joy and dizzying relief washing through her. “Don’t you ever scare us like that again,” she whispered.

“Wasn’t trying,” Helena admitted in hushed tones. “Thanks for getting me out of there.”

Dinah drifted closer, eyeing Barbara with concern. “She’s going to regret that when she straightens up.”

Helena turned her head, her gaze sweeping over Barbara’s features. “Her back will. She won’t,” she said softly.

Admitting that was probably true, Dinah couldn’t help but stare, enchanted by the love in Helena’s eyes as she watched Barbara sleep. “Think you could eat?” she asked reluctantly, hating to interrupt the moment.

“Yeah,” Helena said. “Starving, actually.”

“Just this once, I’ll actually bring you breakfast in bed.”

Something flickered across Helena’s features, and Dinah felt an unexpected flash of fear from the other woman. Unconsciously, Dinah’s gaze jerked to Helena’s legs where they rested under the blankets.

“Can’t feel ‘em,” Helena admitted. “So yeah… breakfast in bed would be good.”

“Helena,” Dinah began but her friend shook her head.

“One thing to worry about at a time, kid,” Helena told her, but Dinah suspected Helena was trying to convince herself as well.

“Stomach first?” Dinah offered, keeping her tone intentionally light.

Helena managed a smile. “Stomach first.”

“Eggs, pancakes, and bacon coming right up.”

“Don’t forget the coffee,” Helena called after her a little too loudly, feeling Barbara stir in reaction.

“Sonofa…” Barbara muttered when she started to straighten, her muscles cramping painfully.

“You could have just crawled up here,” Helena teased, liking the idea of sleeping next to the redhead. She’d never been much of a snuggler, but she suspected she would be with Barbara Gordon in her bed.

Inhaling in surprise, Barbara lifted her head and found Helena’s eyes waiting for her at close range.

“Morning, Babs,” Helena greeted with as much cheeky energy as she could muster.

“Helena,” Barbara whispered with the beginnings of a smile. Her back complained bitterly and her eyes burned from crying, but her physical discomfort drifted into the background as she got lost in the other woman’s eyes.

“You look like shit,” Helena told her bluntly, earning herself a relieved chuckle from the older woman.

“Trust me, you look worse.” Barbara shook her head in disbelief at Helena’s ability to heal, thanking God that Draco hadn’t taken this woman from her life.

Helena bravely reached out and let her fingertips ghost over Barbara’s features. “Thought I was never going to see you again,” she admitted. “Guess the doc knows her stuff.”

Barbara swallowed, startled by her body’s intense reaction to Helena’s touch. She could feel her skin warming and she cleared her throat self-consciously. “I wasn’t worried,” she replied drolly.

One dark, elegant eyebrow lifted in disbelief.

“Much,” Barbara amended with a smile. “Told you not to go in there.”

“I wondered how long it was going to take you to say ‘I told you so.’ You held out longer than I would have suspected.”

“I live to surprise you,” Barbara teased back. Her breath caught unexpectedly when she thought about how close she’d come to losing this, this warm, welcome banter between them. Tears stung her eyes and she had to drop her head, embarrassed that Helena would see. The younger woman’s thumb swiped softly over her cheek, wiping the one traitorous tear that managed to escape.

“I knew you’d find a way to save me,” Helena murmured, touched by the emotion Barbara was trying to hide. “Not so thrilled you used little miss ‘sky blue eyes’ but I’ll get over it.”

Barbara leaned back, wiping at her eyes as she shook her head. “And here we go…”

“She is hot,” Helena continued, needling the other woman playfully. She watched a blush bloom on Barbara’s cheeks and was charmed at the sight. “Hell of a right hook, too.”

Wearing a stern expression that Helena wasn’t buying for a second, Barbara warned her off the topic. “Enough of that.”

“What?” Helena asked innocently. “I told you if you needed tips on how to get a rush with a woman I was here for you.” Helena smiled but she hoped Barbara wouldn’t take her up on the offer where the doctor was concerned.

They stared at each other for a long moment, both their smiles slowly falling away.

“Okay,” Barbara said carefully. “We’ve joked and we’ve teased… now you need to tell me how you’re feeling. Truthfully, Helena.”

Helena thought about lying, but she couldn’t, not when those earnest green eyes were still so close. She swallowed, trying to keep a handle on her fears. “I can’t…” Licking her lips, she tried again. “I can’t feel…”

“Your legs,” Barbara breathed. She felt sick as Helena nodded jerkily, a vulnerability she’d never seen before entering her friend’s eyes. “There was a piece of metal… it lodged in your spine,” Barbara informed her. “It… severed… some nerves.”

Taking an unsteady breath, Helena watched her. “It’s bad, isn’t it?”

Wiping a hand over her mouth, Barbara nodded. “It’s… it’s in the same spot as mine, Hel.”

“So that crack about a matching set of wheels isn’t so far off, huh?” Helena joked, trying to keep her tone light, but she could feel panic starting to set in. She was wrenched out of her fears by Barbara’s hand tightening on hers.

“We don’t know that. The… the paralysis…” Barbara said, tripping over the word she’d used hundreds of times, “could be temporary.”

Hearing the term made Helena’s heart speed up. “You said it severed…” Her voice wavered and she cursed herself inwardly when Barbara’s gaze zeroed in on her with laser-like focus.

“Your nerves were severed. Nick did all she could to reattach them. It was a long surgery.”

“It’s Nick now, huh?” Helena grumbled, not sure what was upsetting her more, her injury or Barbara’s growing closeness to the doctor.

“Helena…” Barbara took a breath. “You had extensive internal damage and much of that is already healing at a rapid rate. There is no reason to suspect this is going to be permanent.”

“That you talking or the doc?” Helena wanted to know.

“It’s her,” Nick said as she eased into the room. She was dressed in jeans and a white t-shirt, her feet bare. She’d clearly just rolled out of bed a few minutes ago, and Helena almost scowled at how appealing she managed to look. “But you shouldn’t have survived let alone be awake and talking right now, so what they hell do I know?”

Helena and Barbara both looked at her and Nick was struck by the apparent intimacy of the moment she’d just interrupted. “Sorry to intrude,” she murmured. “I heard voices and thought I should see how the patient was doing.”

“You hear voices?” Helena jabbed. “You let a woman who hears voices operate on my ass?” she glanced at Barbara, mustering a mildly outraged expression.

“Slightly above your ass, actually,” Nick responded without missing a beat.

Helena’s eyebrows arched at the comeback.

“How are you feeling?”

“Like I got blown up,” Helena answered honestly.

“Anything hurt more than anything else?”

“Only half of me is hurting. The other half doesn’t feel a thing,” Helena informed her with mock cheerfulness. She heard Barbara make a soft sound of distress and instantly felt contrite. She sighed. “No,” she said honestly. “What I can feel just feels like crap, but nothing hurts worse than anything else.”

“So no sensation in your legs then?” Nick asked, not bothering to pull punches.

Helena swallowed, aware of Barbara’s eyes on her profile. She shook her head.

“I’m not going to sugar coat things with you, Helena,” Nick told her. “You suffered a major traumatic injury to your spine.”

“So I’m…” Helena paused, looking for a word that wouldn’t offend Barbara but coming up empty.

“We don’t know. As Barbara said, you heal damn fast. I want you to get another few days of bed rest then we’ll reevaluate… see if another surgery is necessary.”

“Fun,” Helena grumbled. She cast a look at Barbara, noting with a frown how the other woman was now staring down at her own feet. “Isn’t there anything I can do?”

“Rest,” Nick insisted. “It may not be a normal state of being for you, but it’s what you need, no matter how fast you heal.”

“Doctors orders, huh?” Helena asked Barbara, trying to get the other woman to look at her again. Barbara slowly nodded but kept her eyes averted. “Fine. As long as you keep me company.” That did the trick, causing Barbara to look up at her in surprise.

“Whatever works,” Nick said flatly.

Dinah chose that moment to edge back into the room with a large tray of breakfast in her hands. Barbara moved back so she could settle it over Helena. All of the women had to admit it smelled wonderful.

Nick leaned over and plucked the cup of coffee off the tray just as Helena started to reach for it first. “Sorry. No caffeine. You need rest.” With a smirk, she took a sip and left them to their meal.

“Oh hell no,” Helena muttered, secretly a little impressed with the doctor’s pluckiness. “I want a second opinion.”

Barbara chuckled before she snatched a piece of Helena’s bacon for herself.

“You too? Taking food from the sick and infirm. Do you have no shame?” Helena was able to shove her fears to the back of her mind as she focused on the welcome smile that graced Barbara’s features. Whatever was going to happen from here, she swore to herself she would deal with it as long as she got to see that smile.

“Alfred can make more,” Barbara promised her.

“Fine,” Helena grumbled playfully. “I’ll share. This time.” She watched as Dinah pulled up a chair and they all dug in. One bite went down like a stone when Helena realized she’d been given a second chance to be here with these two women who meant so much to her. Her emotions see-sawed from happy, to terrified, and back again, leaving her feeling confused but grateful.

“Thanks,” Helena said suddenly to both of them.

“Our pleasure,” Dinah told her without missing a beat. “Besides, now you owe me one.”

Helena glanced in disbelief at Barbara as Dinah scooped up a forkful of Helena’s eggs. Barbara just smiled.

The sense of family felt tenuous and fragile, but Helena clung to it fiercely, knowing it might be the only thing that could help her survive whatever happened next.

TBC


	7. Chapter 7

Nick sat in silence at the Delphi terminal, her gaze sweeping over the computers and the various attached peripherals. Sunlight warmed her back as it peered in through the windows behind her, making New Gotham glint and sparkle in a way she hadn’t seen since her arrival. She’d savored her morning coffee on the balcony and watched the city come alive, contemplating how radically her worldview had changed in the last few days. When the sun’s rays had finally become too brilliant to endure without sunglasses, she’d drifted back inside. Everyone else was still sleeping, leaving her to her own devices.

Biting her lower lip, Nick gave in to temptation. She placed her hand over the mouse on her right and brought the computers out of sleep mode. She blinked at the numerous screens, all of them giving her a dizzying array of data. Police reports on Draco cascaded across one screen, incident reports on the school explosion on another. It had been nearly a week since Helena had regained consciousness. Nick had yet to see Barbara on the computer during that time so she surmised the redhead was digging into things at night as they all slept. 

“You shouldn’t be looking at that.”

Nick jumped as Dinah’s voice drifted over her shoulder. The teenager was right behind her, and Nick wondered how she had gotten that close without her knowing it. She turned in her chair and glanced up at the young woman. “Why not? I was in that school when it blew, and I’ve got my own bone to pick with Draco.”

Dinah’s gaze shifted away for a moment before fixing on the doctor again. “I know all about your sister.” She reached around the older woman to turn the monitors off. 

“Shouldn’t someone be minding the store, so to speak?” Nick asked, rubbed raw at the thought of any of these women digging into her life after what she’d done for them. “Your little crime fighting club might miss out.”

Dinah’s jaw set and Nick could tell she’d hit a nerve.

“I’ve been keeping an eye on things so Barbara can stay with Helena.”

“How noble.” Nick realized she was in a surely mood and taking it out on the teen. For the life of her, however, she didn’t seem to be able to stop herself. 

“How necessary,” Dinah answered coldly. “You don’t live in New Gotham. You don’t know what it’s like here.”

Nick leaned back. “You really think you make a difference? That for every punk you take off the street another one won’t just take his place?”

“It has to be done. Don’t lecture me. I know what you were going to do to Draco the night you met Barbara. At least we don’t kill.”

Nick lapsed into stunned silence as Dinah moved away, the sunlight dappling over her blonde hair as she tidied up. Nick swallowed. “Barbara told you?” 

“I’m meta,” Dinah reminded her, fighting the temptation to use her gift to freak the other woman out. 

Drawing in a slow breath, Nick felt the anger leach out of her as she recalled the glimpses she’d had of Dinah’s skills. Barbara had told her Dinah was psychic but she still wasn’t certain she believed it. 

“Barbara handed me the card you gave her.” Pausing, Dinah remembered the wave of frustration and misery that had washed over her in that moment. She rubbed at her eyes and willed herself to cut the other woman a little slack. “I… wasn’t ready for…” She cleared her throat. “I got a good blast of your memories and emotions. That sucks,” Dinah added, sounding like a teenager for the first time since the conversation had began.

Nick raked a hand through her hair and sighed. “I can’t imagine what that must be like.”

“It can come in handy, but sometimes, when it catches you off guard like that…”

“I don’t want to feel this way.” Nick lowered her head and stared at her hands where they were now loosely linked in her lap. She’d taken an oath to use those hands to heal, not to kill, but she still wanted to wrap them around Draco’s throat and squeeze. “I’m sorry that you got a… taste of that.”

More than a taste, Dinah thought, but she didn’t say the truth out loud. She shrugged. “Alfred should be here soon. He’ll make breakfast,” she offered, putting an end to the uncomfortable conversation. Turning, she started to walk away.

“Dinah, wait.”

Glancing back, Nick was looking at her with those clear blue eyes and Dinah felt herself frozen to the spot. She was striking, Dinah had to admit. She couldn’t really blame Barbara for being affected, but she hoped like hell Barbara wouldn’t act on her attraction. If anything good could possibly come of Helena’s accident, it was the reality that Barbara and Helena couldn’t run from what they felt for each other anymore. Maybe they would finally face it. “Yeah?” she asked hesitantly.

“When you got… the vibes… emotions… whatever off that card… was there anything that made you think I was…?” Nick trailed off, not sure what she wanted to ask.

“Like me?” Folding her arms, Dinah leaned against the sofa and regarded the other woman for a silent moment. She shrugged again. “Metas tend to come through more strongly than your average human. Their emotions can be more powerful.”

“Is that a vague way of saying yes?” Nick managed a weak smirk for the teen.

“You knocked me out cold.” Dinah leaned forward in curiosity. “You really didn’t know that you were special? You’ve never noticed any special skills?”

Unsettled, Nick crossed her own arms and leaned back in the chair, resisting the urge to pace. “Not really. I mean… I’ve excelled academically. I’m sharper than most tools in the shed, as my father liked to say, but nothing like you.” She waved at the young woman. “Nothing like Helena.”

Dinah smiled. “You’re stronger than most. You were throwing some seriously heavy blocks of concrete off Helena like they weighed nothing. The fact that you stood your ground in a fight with her says a lot.”

“I’m not some kind of damn super hero,” Nick grumbled.

“Didn’t say you were. There are lots of metas who have normal lives. Most do, in fact. There are just a handful of us who have chosen to do this.”

“Save the world,” Nick clarified.

Another shrug. “The city, at least.”

The elevator door opened and Alfred appeared. He drew up when he saw them near the Delphi, casting them a curious look before moving toward the kitchen. “Good morning, Miss Dinah. Doctor Kincaid.” 

“Morning, Alfred,” Dinah replied.

“Is he meta?” Nick asked when the butler was out of earshot.

“Alfred?” Dinah blurted, aghast at the suggestion. She started to shake her head only to lapse into contemplative stillness. “I… He is really stealthy,” she murmured thoughtfully.

“Look,” Nick began slowly. “I’m sorry I’m being… bitchy,” she said, deciding the word was probably tame compared to what Dinah would hear from thugs on the street. “I guess I’m just…”

“Freaking out. I understand. You should talk to Barbara. She can help you figure out other special abilities you might not even know you have.”

“I know you think that’s supposed to be comforting. Barbara has already offered to do some tests. Not sure how I feel about being the patient instead of the doctor.” 

“It’s not like they hurt. They just measure your abilities. You should let her help.” Dinah stood and turned toward the kitchen. “Being meta can be pretty darn cool when you finally wrap your head around it.” She left Nick to think, curious over what skills Barbara might discover when she finally put the doctor to the test.

****

Barbara propped her chin on her fist and smiled. Helena never looked innocent of anything, but in the early light of morning and fast asleep, Barbara thought she came awfully close. Her friend was breathing slowly, her dark hair tousled about her features, the sun bathing her skin. It almost hurt Barbara’s heart to look at her.

Over the last week, Helena’s color had improved dramatically, and the cuts and bruises that had mottled her skin were almost completely gone now. Even though what was on the surface was healing nicely, it was what Barbara couldn’t see that had her hovering over the other woman in the early hour.

Helena was putting on a brave front, but Barbara remembered all too well what it was like to slowly accept the idea that she would likely never walk again. As the days passed and feeling refused to return to Helena’s legs, Barbara could see cracks starting to form in the younger woman’s armor. Barbara had been the same way, determined to prove everyone wrong, but inwardly she had been utterly terrified. She could only imagine what was going through Helena’s head right now. Helena sure as hell wasn’t going to tell her.

The tip of a finger trailed down her cheek to her chin and Barbara started, sucking in a surprised breath and ignoring the tingle that the touch caused all the way to her toes. Contact with Helena always did that to her. Barbara told herself it was just another of Helena’s quirks as a meta, even though she had no empirical evidence to support that theory. “Hey,” she greeted sleepy blue eyes as Helena smiled drowsily at her. 

“You looked serious.” Helena’s voice was still hoarse with sleep. 

“Did I? Just lost in thought, I guess.” It wasn’t a complete lie, but Barbara knew Helena would see through it. The younger woman always did.

“Don’t give up on me,” Helena pleaded gently. “The feeling will come back.”

Barbara bit her lower lip. “Hel…”

“Come on, Barbara. I had a major trauma to my spine. It stands to reason it’ll take a few more days to heal.”

Days. Barbara shook her head, remembering the months and years of recovery she’d endured. Even now, physical therapy was still a daily part of her life. “And what happens when a few days are up?”

The younger woman swallowed and looked away, focusing her attention on the far wall. “You think I won’t walk again.”

“I didn’t say that,” Barbara said instantly, hurting inside for the lost tone that had entered Helena’s voice. She wanted to believe the outcome for Helena would be different than her own, and at the core of her soul she wasn’t ready to let go of that hope. “But we need to be realistic.”

“Realistic. You’re nothing if not that.” Helena’s lips quirked into a sad smile. “So where is the doc?”

“Helena.” Barbara knew they needed to talk about things both of them would rather not. Reaching out, she wrapped her fingers around Helena’s arm, waiting her friend out until Helena turned her head and looked at her. “I’ve been here, where you are right now. I know every thought running through your head. You can talk to me.”

Slowly, Helena shook her head. “That’s exactly why I can’t.”

Stung, Barbara started to pull back, but Helena reached out, grabbing her hand and holding her there.

“Babs… You struggle with this every day and here I am, dredging up all of these memories for you…”

“It’s all right.”

“It’s not,” Helena answered with some heat. “It’s not. You’ve been through this once. I was there and watched it nearly break you. You really want to go through it again?”

“I’m too stubborn to break,” Barbara vowed, “and I would go through it a thousand times if I had to for you, you know that.”

Helena felt her breath hitch at the conviction she heard in Barbara’s voice. It was just as clear in her green eyes. “And what if…?” She swallowed, trying to wrap her head around the possibility that she might not ever be able to run across Gotham’s rooftops again. She tried to imagine herself living Barbara’s life and failed. All she had was her physical prowess. She was nothing without it. “What if…?” 

Barbara heard the waver in her friend’s voice and she reached out again, this time tangling their fingers. Helena’s grip was warm and sure in her own, and Barbara found she didn’t want to let go. “We’ll figure it out. I promise.”

Helena wasn’t convinced, but she didn’t want to disappoint the woman at her bedside, not for anything. Today was another day above ground, she reminded herself. Another day in Barbara’s company. That had to count for something.

Their gazes lingered as the scent of coffee began to fill the air. Barbara squeezed the hand in hers. “No matter what, I’m always going to love you. We’re always going to be a team.”

Even though Barbara didn’t mean the words the way Helena wanted her to, they were enough to get her out of bed. Reluctantly letting go of Barbara’s hand, Helena tossed off the covers. “She still here?”

Barbara rolled back, grabbing the arm of the other wheelchair. “If you mean Nick, then yes. I imagine she’s going to need to get back to Chicago soon.”

“Better jump her now while you have the chance.” 

“Watch it,” Barbara warned her. “The one good thing about all this? You can’t run away every time you get uncomfortable or make a smart remark.” She reached out and pinched Helena in the side, earning an undignified squawk from the younger woman.

“I might not be able to run, but I bet I can roll faster than you.”

“I’m not taking that bet.” Barbara moved closer, doing her best not to lecture or help as Helena eased herself out of bed and into the chair. She had to remind herself that even though it had only been a handful of days, Helena was months ahead in her recovery compared to a normal human.

Helena lost her grip on the chair and started to tumble into it, but Barbara had the upper body strength to break her fall, easing her into the seat instead. Helena wanted to be angry at herself, but pressed against the redhead, feeling Barbara’s firm muscle and soft curves, she decided to count her blessings. With a smirk, she waited until Barbara glanced up to check on her and then leaned in and gave the older woman a quick kiss on the mouth.

“Thanks,” Helena drawled, savoring the way her skin tingled at the touch and enjoying the stunned look in Barbara’s green eyes. “Now out of way my, woman. I need some coffee.”

Barbara watched her go, her fingertips drifting to her lower lip before a shy, confused smile graced her features. With a sigh and shake of her head at Helena’s antics, Barbara followed the sound of friendly voices and the scent of breakfast.

****

“It’s remarkable.”

Barbara glanced up at the doctor, frowning at the faint tone of wonder in the other woman’s voice. Hours had passed since breakfast, and she and Helena had spent the majority of that time working through some physical therapy routines. Sweat coated her features and bare shoulders, but Barbara felt cleaner than she had in days. The workout had cleared her mind, and Helena seemed to feel better for it as well.

“Have you… studied them? A meta’s healing properties?” Nick crossed her arm and watched Helena do some chin-ups, slowly and carefully lifting herself out of the chair.

“Would you wanted to be treated like a lab rat?”

Startled, Nick turned to look at her. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just… whatever is causing her to heel so rapidly… can you imagine what it could do for humans? People like yourself?” 

Barbara blinked. Her gaze strayed to Helena once more, taking in the younger woman’s finely toned arms with quiet appreciation. Gene therapy was something she’d considered and even tried, but never from a meta stand point. She shook her head. “Too risky. One of the perils of being meta is that humans covet your abilities. No offense, but the medical establishment would lock metas up and study them if given the chance. Many would see them as a threat.”

“You think that’s how I see them?”

Shrugging, Barbara took a sip from her bottle of water. “You’re not handling the idea that you could be meta terribly well, Nick.”

The doctor sighed, feeling guilty. “I don’t believe in locking people up because they’re different.”

“Not everyone is as open-minded as you.” 

Nick frowned. “Point taken. I just can’t help but wonder if there is something there that could help people like you. I’m a doctor. I can’t help but look for cures.”

“Maybe.” Barbara wouldn’t speculate any more than that. It felt like taking advantage and she would be damned before she ever did that to Helena or Dinah. She decided to change the subject. “I suppose you’ll be heading back to Chicago soon.”

There was a notable hesitation in the doctor’s response and Barbara lifted an eyebrow in silent inquiry.

“I called them this morning. Took a leave of absence.”

“I see.” Barbara took another sip from her water bottle before screwing the cap back on and tucking the bottle away. “Because of the meta thing?”

“Partly. I can’t leave New Gotham until Draco is brought to some kind of justice, either. I just can’t.”

“I understand,” Barbara said and meant it. A thought niggled at the base of her brain and she regarded the doctor speculatively. “This evening we’ll start running some tests to determine your abilities.”

“I’m more worried about Draco,” Nick admitted.

“I think understanding one might help us achieve the other.”

They stared at each other.

“You want me to be a little crime fighter for you?” Nick realized.

Barbara replied with a one-shoulder shrug, aware of Helena’s attention on them even though the younger woman was still going through her paces. Helena knew the routine backwards and forwards, having worked with Barbara on her rehabilitation for years. “The thought crossed my mind, at least on a trial basis.”

Nick laughed, but the sound had a nervous edge to it. “I don’t think I’m crime fighter material.”

“I’m not so sure I agree.” Barbara studied her, barely concealing a smirk when the doctor began to fidget. “But let’s take things one step at a time, if you’re up for some truths about yourself, that is.” Barbara wheeled back toward Helena, all too aware of the doctor’s gaze on her back. She’d seen her share of raw talent in her time, and Barbara had a feeling she might be looking at another diamond in the rough. Smiling as her scientific curiosity purred with interest, Barbara wondered what surprises the other woman would have in store for her that evening.

**** 

“You two are getting chummy.” Helena grimaced at the sour tone to her voice. “Should I let you have the room?”

Barbara gave her a quick glare as she rolled to a stop next to the younger woman. “Don’t start.” She motioned toward the mat. “Let’s stretch you out a little. You’ve done enough for today.”

“I can do more.” Helena hated to be coddled, even if it was Barbara doing the coddling. She didn’t like the growing closeness she could see between Babs and the doctor, either. The combination made her feel snippy, and she couldn’t decide if she wanted to take it out on the redhead or send her away before things got ugly.

Green eyes zeroed in on Helena, reading her so effortlessly it made her mad. 

“Hel…”

“I’m fine.” Helena pushed back from the bar and rolled a few paces away, needing distance suddenly. “Why don’t you go hang out with the doc for a while? Maybe she can be my replacement.”

Barbara paused, and Helena could tell she’d struck a nerve. She couldn’t stop herself from doing it again. “You think I don’t know what’s going on in your head? You need someone who can kick a little ass, and without me around to do your bidding…”

“That’s enough.” Barbara swallowed, feeling her whole body shake at what Helena was suggesting. She was glad Nick had left the room. “She wants revenge against Draco for killing her sister. Right now, I want more than a little of that myself.” She took a slow breath when she felt her temper rising to a level she rarely let it. Her hands fisted around the armrests of her chair and squeezed. “She’s going after him one way or another, Helena. Maybe I can keep her alive if I help her understand what she’s capable of.”

“Like I said, a replacement.” Helena started for the door, but Barbara was faster, using her own chair to block Helena’s escape. Their wheels rammed together, and Helena felt herself almost tip before Barbara’s hand came down on the arm of her chair and slammed it back to the floor.

They were face to face, both of them breathing hard as the sweat dried on their skin.

“No one can ever replace you. Do you hear me?” Barbara’s gaze was intent on Helena’s. “Don’t think it. Don’t suggest it. You honestly think you only matter to me as muscle?”

Helena couldn’t look at her now, seeing the hurt and anger in Barbara’s eyes. “That is all I am.”

“You’re my family.” Barbara’s voice broke and Helena glanced back at her, startled and remorseful. “But maybe all I am to you is the brains. God knows I don’t have any more to offer you than that.”

“Barbara… that’s not… I didn’t…” Helena furiously tried to find a way to get herself out of the hole she’d just dug herself into. “You know I don’t see you like that…”

“Then what makes you think I would see you any differently?”

Caught, Helena opened her mouth only to close it. Words continued to elude her as Barbara jerked her chair back and pivoted easily before rolling out of the room.

Frustration had Helena pounding her fists so hard on her armrests that they bent and twisted. Helpless to do anything else, she put her head down in her hands, feeling the tears she’d been fighting for days start to come.

Just outside the door, Barbara listened to Helena softly crying, her own tears slipping unchecked down her cheeks. The whole conversation had hurt like hell, but she’d known it was coming. It was bad enough that Helena was dealing with the physical toll of her injuries, but Barbara knew the emotional repercussions were just beginning. This time Helena couldn’t run from her feelings, and Barbara prayed she would have the wisdom and patience to help the younger woman through the mental pain and grief that lie ahead.

Barbara closed her eyes, fighting the overwhelming urge to go back and comfort the younger woman, but she knew what Helena was experiencing. She knew what had to be done.

Looking down at her legs, Barbara seemed to see the chair beyond them differently. She’d always wondered why this had happened to her, but now she had a reason she could live with. Barbara had endured her own paralysis so she could help Helena now. 

The realization settled her and she took a slow breath, feeling like she was exactly where she was supposed to be, the way she was supposed to be, for the first time since her shooting. 

“Ms. Barbara, is everything all right?” Alfred appeared seemingly out of thin air at her side.

Barbara reached up and wiped away a few remaining tears. “No,” she admitted. “But it will be.”

TBC


	8. Chapter 8

He’d made the fool suffer.

Draco was well aware his man was only trying to impress him. He’d overheard Draco making plans to learn more about Barbara Gordon and had deduced by his tone that the schoolteacher was a threat. Rather than ask for direction, however, his minion had branched out on his own, planting the bomb in Gordon’s classroom. Thankfully the bastard had missed his target. Had he deprived Draco of the chance to make Gordon pay with his own hands, he would still be wailing for mercy. 

Stepping back from the moonlit river, Draco wiped his bloody hands on a handkerchief, dismissing his now deceased henchman from his mind as the current dragged his mutilated corpse into the murky depths below. Draco slipped into his waiting limousine, his driver saying nothing as he settled back against the leather interior and proceeded to pour himself a tumbler of whiskey. 

As he savored his first sip, his thoughts chewed on Barbara Gordon as they had since that night outside the club. He knew she’d been nowhere near the blast that had destroyed her classroom and part of her school. His sources inside the police department had confirmed it. Gordon had apparently decided to lay low for now, but he suspected she was plotting revenge. The notion made him wary, and he had more guards with him than he liked as a result.

It was insane to think a simple wheelchair-bound schoolteacher could destroy him, but Draco knew she was a potent threat. She would come for him somehow, someway. His best chance was to get to her first.

He let his mind imagine the possibilities as the limousine pulled back on the road. He was expecting company in the coming hour and it wouldn’t do to be late, especially when his guest would bring welcome details about the women he couldn’t stop thinking about.

****

“We don’t have to do this.”

Barbara pursed her lips to keep them from lifting into a smile. Nick was fidgeting in her chair, looking less than thrilled at being hooked up to so many wires and electrodes. “It’s not like it will hurt.”

Nick shifted again and gazed longingly out the balcony doors to the night beyond. She suddenly wanted a pizza, a drink, even a walk… anything to keep from going through with Barbara’s plans. “Maybe not physically. Not sure about mentally.”

Glancing up from her keyboard, Barbara frowned. “We don’t actually have to do this,” she said. “If you’re really that worried…”

Sighing, Nick rolled her eyes at herself. “Just get on with it.”

“We already started.” Barbara smiled this time when she saw Nick’s head snap in her direction. “I just wasn’t going to tell you any of the results.”

“So what do I do?”

“Relax. I’m just getting some baseline readings.”

Nick cocked her head, trying to see the screens. “Learn anything interesting?”

“Other than the fact you can’t sit still for five minutes?”

The doctor crossed her arms and nearly yanked some of the electrodes off her skin. Barbara gave her a look of reprimand but didn’t comment. 

Dinah came out of her room and leaned her arms on the cold rail, watching the proceedings below with interest. Neither of the two women seemed to be aware of her presence and she had no inclination to change that. She could still feel the undercurrent of attraction between them, but Barbara’s initial infatuation had been tempered by Helena’s accident. Her mentor was too worried about Helena to have much room for romantic feelings for the doctor. A welcome mercy, Dinah decided, under the circumstances.

As Barbara and Nick traded barbs below, Dinah glanced toward the gym. She could hear Helena putting herself through her paces and she frowned. Her friend had kept to herself the rest of the day, and she sensed some kind of upset between Helena and Barbara that she hadn’t been able to put her finger on. She decided she would take a more direct approach if things didn’t seem to resolve themselves by tomorrow.

“You’ve got to be kidding.”

Dinah turned and stifled a laugh as Barbara positioned a clear dome loaded with sensors over the doctor’s head. She remembered being inside the contraption herself, and she had to admit it looked a little silly.

“It’s what all the fashionable metas are sporting this fall,” Barbara drawled as she wheeled back to the Delphi terminal. She studied the readings with interest, narrowing her green eyes as she watched the steady brainwave patterns stream across her screen. “Do you know what I’m thinking right now?”

“That I look ridiculous?”

Barbara grinned before adjusting her glasses. “I mean I actually want you to try to tell me what I’m thinking right now.”

Dinah was curious so she closed her eyes and focused, startled when she felt the cold, ugly touch of anger coming from Barbara just beneath the surface. “Draco,” Dinah whispered, shivering at the seething rage Barbara had managed to keep hidden until now. 

After an uncertain moment, Nick closed her eyes and did her best to sense what was on the other woman’s mind. After a full minute, she shook her head. “Nothing is coming through or whatever you call it.”

Barbara nodded and clicked a few keys on her keyboard. “You’re not psychic,” she confirmed. “Not that I suspected you were, really.”

Nick clearly wasn’t sure if that was a compliment or an insult.

Dinah watched Barbara put the other woman through every test, each of them coming up negative again and again. They’d been at it for almost two hours by the time Barbara sat back in her chair and frowned.

“Maybe you were wrong. Maybe I’m just as ordinary as you.” Nick sounded almost pleased by the idea.

Barbara shook her head. “Your baseline readings are consistent with most metas. We just haven’t figured out what your thing is yet.”

“My thing?” Nick reached up and swung the scanner away from her head. “Gee, it sounds so attractive when you put it like that.”

Smiling, Dinah shook her head. She had to admit she liked the doctor, she just wasn’t a fan of her growing closeness to Barbara.

Barbara bit her lower lip, considering what avenue to explore next. Finally, she rolled closer, stopping just in front of the doctor and regarding her curiously. “Why medicine?”

Nick blinked. “What?”

“Why did you go into medicine?”

The doctor shrugged. “I felt… drawn to it, I guess.”

“Are you good at it?”

“Not bad.”

Green eyes narrowed as Barbara slipped off her glasses. “Give me numbers.”

Nick started to run her hand through her hair only to remember the wires and electrodes when they pulled on her skin. “Fine. I’m very good.”

“How many patients have you lost?”

The doctor’s jaw clenched. “That’s… that’s not something I want to talk about.”

“I’m guessing you don’t lose many, and the ones you did lose probably suffered significant trauma.” Barbara leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees as she watched Nick’s features for clues. She’d struck a nerve and she suspected she was on to something.

“Are we done?” Nick didn’t wait for an answer as she started pulling the electrodes off her forehead. She ignored Barbara as the other woman rolled closer until the redhead reached out and caught her wrist.

Dinah took a breath as she felt the heat from that contact rush through them both. They stared at each other as she looked on, and Dinah swallowed roughly as her throat went dry.

“Am I right?” 

“What difference does it make?” Nick slowly pulled away, appearing off-balance.

“It means your gift could be something on a molecular level.” Barbara licked her lips and pivoted her chair to return to the Delphi. Tossing her glasses on the desk, she then typed in a few simple commands. “Or maybe even some kind of telekinesis.” 

“You already tried to make me heat up or freeze a glass of water.”

“I think it might be more sophisticated than that.” Barbara clicked a few more keys before she turned to look at the doctor once more, her mental gears turning quickly. She wiped a hand over her mouth. “Come here.”

Nick finished stripping the electrodes from her skin before rising and coming closer. Settling on the side of the desk, she waited patiently for Barbara to speak her mind. As she watched, Barbara reached under the desk and suddenly a knife appeared in her hand, the light winking off the blade. Nick flinched in surprised and barely stifled a yell as the teacher drew the knife across her own palm. 

“Christ! Barbara, what the hell!” Nick grabbed the knife and flung it away, hearing it sink into a nearby wall up to the hilt. 

Dinah went still, shocked by what she’d just witnessed.

“Let me see,” Nick demanded, prying Barbara’s fingers away from the wound and ignoring her slight wince of pain. “What in the hell did you do that for?” She jerked when Barbara reached out and grabbed her hand, feeling the slick smear of blood where it warmed her own skin. “Damn it!” She told herself to pull her hand free, but instead she clamped down, holding tight as she pictured the injury in her mind. 

Barbara kept her gaze on the doctor, watching as Nick’s eyes suddenly dilated. Her hand felt warm in the doctor’s and it only grew hotter as Nick struggled to stay in the moment.

After counting to thirty, Barbara let her go. Nick sucked in a sharp breath, her eyes returning to normal as she glanced down at her hand. It was covered in Barbara’s blood.

Flexing her fingers, Barbara looked at her palm and felt her heart skip a beat.

“What?” the doctor croaked, seeing something in Barbara’s features. She felt dizzy when Barbara rotated her wrist and showed Nick her hand, revealing skin free of injury.

“That’s not…” Nick shook her head, a buzzing in her ears that wouldn’t go away.

“Should have guessed. That’s probably the only reason Helena survived. You can heal by touch. At least to a point.” Barbara gave her an encouraging and grateful smile.

Nick didn’t see it as the buzzing turned into a roaring and she slumped to the floor t Barbara’s feet.

Barbara glanced up at Dinah, aware the teen had been watching all along. “A little help?”

****

“By touch?”

Dinah nodded as she sat on the floor of the gym, watching as Helena toweled off her sweat-soaked skin. “Barbara thinks that might just be the surface of her abilities. If she can learn to control them she might be able to manipulate a lot of things on a molecular level.”

“Like walking through walls?” Helena had always thought that would be cool and she was pissed the doctor would get to do it.

Dinah shrugged. “Maybe.” She looked at Helena, aching a little for how tired and withdrawn she seemed. “At least she was already using her gift instinctually where you are concerned.”

“Lucky me.”

Helena knew she was being bitchy, but her earlier altercation with Barbara was still wearing on her mind. The last thing she wanted to hear was that she owed the doctor any kind of favor, even though she knew in her gut she did. As far as she was concerned, however, if Kincaid got Barbara into bed then they were well past even.

“Why don’t you just tell her?” Dinah asked softly, sensing the turn in Helena’s thoughts.

Blue eyes rolled at the suggestion. “I’m not into pointless declarations, kid.”

“You sure it would be pointless?”

Helena twisted the towel in her hands before meeting Dinah’s gaze. “You’ve seen the way she looks at her.”

Dinah swallowed, surprised by Helena’s openness. “Barbara is attracted,” Dinah confirmed, “but she’s more focused on you.”

“I don’t need her pity.” Helena draped the towel around her neck and stared down at her legs, hating them for refusing to do what she’d been pushing them to. She felt nothing from them, and they had yet to budge in spite of all her mental screaming for them to do so.

“Pity? You really think Barbara is going to pity you? Do you pity her?”

Helena glared at the younger woman. “You know I don’t.”

“Then stop it already. I know you’re moody and egotistical but take a break for an hour, would ya?”

Helena stared, shocked into silence by Dinah’s frustration with her.

Dinah got to her feet. “Look. I want you with Barbara. I like Nick but it feels so… surface between the two of them. What runs between you and Barbara is more real… it runs deeper.”

“Barbara still sees me as that lost kid she took in after my mother died. This injury just makes it worse. I’m someone to mother… not someone to…” Helena swallowed and kept the rest of her miserable thoughts to herself.

Coming closer, Dinah sank to her knees in front of Helena’s chair. She placed her hands on Helena’s thighs before looking up into her tired blue eyes. “How can Barbara see you as anything else when all you’ve ever done is run away from what you feel?”

Helena started to back away but Dinah got a firm grip on the chair, refusing to let her leave. 

“Stop running. Stop being afraid of what you feel and start fighting for it.”

“Dinah…” Helena didn’t like feeling caged in and she fought the urge to shove the younger woman away. 

“Maybe one good thing can come out of all of this. You can’t run away from Barbara this time. This chair could actually free you instead of trap you, Helena, if you would just…” The teenager let the chair go and Helena rocked back, glaring up at her defiantly. 

“I need a shower.” Helena swiveled away and started out the room.

“You need to stop being a coward,” Dinah called after her.

Barbara was waiting in the hall when Helena rolled out of the gym. She went still, wondering how much of the conversation Barbara had overheard. “How long have you been there?” Helena blurted.

Green eyes narrowed as Barbara cocked her head slightly in reaction to Helena’s bitter tone. “I just came off the elevator,” she said slowly. “Why?”

“Doesn’t matter. None of it matters.” Helena jerked her chair around and wheeled it toward her room, her movements determined and radiating anger.

Dinah stepped out of the gym and met Barbara’s concerned gaze.

“Was it something I said?” the redhead asked ruefully, but her eyes were still on Helena until she disappeared.

“There are none so blind as those who will not see,” Dinah murmured, feeling put out with both of them now. Barbara’s gaze sharpened on her and the teenager shook her head. “You two are hopeless.”

Barbara’s head rocked back in surprise. “What did I do?”

“Maybe if you looked up from your computers every now and then you would know.” 

“Dinah…” Barbara’s tone took on a hint of maternal disapproval.

“Whatever,” the teenager grumbled. “You won’t see what’s right in front of you and she won’t help.”

“And what, exactly, is it that I’m missing?” Barbara crossed her arms, her green eyes flinty. It was clear she wasn’t amused by being vaguely lectured by a teenager.

“Everything.” Dinah shook her head. “She can’t run and you can’t hide. Maybe you’ll finally figure out a thing or two.” With a sigh, she walked down the hall toward her room, ignoring Barbara as the older woman called after her. Without another word, Dinah slammed her door. She sank to the floor, drawing her knees up to her chest. She could feel Helena’s misery and Barbara’s confusion. As far as she was concerned, they deserved what they got.

Alfred had told her not to interfere. At that moment, Dinah wondered if she should tell the butler to stick it.

****

Hours later, Dinah was about to dose off when a soft knock on her door roused her from the outskirts of sleep. She glanced at her alarm clock, frowning at the late hour before tossing her comforter off and padding to her door. “Hey.” She stared stupidly at Nick, not sure what else to say to the doctor she found lingering outside her door.

“I’m going to go for a walk, clear my head a little.” Nick offered her a weak smile. “Figured I should give someone a heads up and you were the only one whose light was still on.”

Dinah glanced back in her room, realizing she’d drifted off as she’d read Hemingway for a book report. “It’s not a good idea to walk around here at night.”

Nick shrugged. “I’ve got cabin fever. Feels like emotions are running a little high around here, too. Just need some fresh air.”

“Hang on.” Dinah darted back into her room and grabbed her tennis shoes, stuffing her feet into them before snagging a light jacket off the back of her desk chair. She shut the door behind her quietly.

“I don’t need a chaperone.” Nick sounded more amused the sarcastic and Dinah decided the doctor didn’t really mind.

“You aren’t the only one who needs fresh air,” Dinah admitted.

Shrugging again, Nick motioned toward the elevator. 

A few minutes later they stepped out into a cool, clear night. Dinah glanced skyward as she reached up to switch on her commlink. Barbara slept with a Delphi alarm next to her bed. If there was trouble, Dinah wanted to be ready. 

“You handling the news Barbara hit you with any better?” Dinah felt the need to keep her voice low, as if she could wake the whole city if she talked much above a whisper. The streets were oddly empty and the quiet was almost intimidating. 

Nick’s lips twisted into a sardonic smirk. “I’m conscious. I supposed that’s an improvement.”

Dinah grinned. “It’s a lot to process.”

“Yeah.” Nick sighed as she gazed down the deserted sidewalks. It almost felt like all of New Gotham was asleep, and she breathed in silence with relief. 

“It’s a pretty cool gift.” Dinah glanced at her companion, hoping to learn a little more.

“I always thought I was a good doctor. Turns out I was cheating and didn’t know it.”

“You weren’t cheating.” Dinah stuffed her hands in her jacket pockets, feeling the chill. “You are good. It’s a combination of being meta and being skilled that helped you save a lot of those people… that helped you save Helena.”

“Maybe. Just a lot to wrap my head around… this idea that I can somehow manipulate matter…”

“Helena’s jealous.”

Nick looked at the teenager in surprise. “Why? She’s the one who can leap buildings in a single bound and all that jazz.”

“If you work at your gift, you might be able to walk through walls.”

The doctor thought about that for a few quiet moments. “That could be kind of cool,” she confessed, a tiny grin finally forming on her lips. 

“Maybe you could help Barbara walk again.”

Nick stopped on the street. She hadn’t thought of that yet, and she felt a flash of anger for being so wrapped up in herself she hadn’t considered anyone else. “I don’t know how it works…” She glanced down at her hands, turning them palms up under the streetlight.

“You’ll figure it out. You seem smart that way.” Dinah smiled, wondering what it would be like to have Barbara back on the streets. Oddly, the idea wasn’t very appealing. As good as Batgirl had been, Oracle made much more of a difference. Dinah wondered if Barbara understood that.

“Gee. Thanks.” 

They walked on in companionable silence, each of them lost to their thoughts.

“So… is… Barbara seeing someone?” Nick finally asked a few minutes later.

Dinah drew in a slow breath, weighing her options. She didn’t want to lie, but there were so many minefields she could step in with her answer she wasn’t sure which direction to go. “No. Not… not really.”

“Not really?”

Dinah stopped walking again and the doctor did the same. 

“Look. I like you. You saved Helena. You have a great sense of humor…”

“I’m sensing a big ‘but’ here…”

“It’s just… Barbara has feelings for someone that she hasn’t really sorted out yet.”

Nick took that in, looking a little crestfallen but thoughtful. “Helena.”

Dinah blinked.

“Don’t look so surprised. I’m smart, remember?”

“You see it?” Dinah asked, drawing closer. Something about Nick’s reaction was encouraging, and Dinah suddenly sensed the doctor could be more of a help than a hindrance.

“I don’t know what the hell is going on between those two. I just get the vibe that there is a bond between them. The way Barbara looked at her before Helena went into surgery…” She swallowed. “I’ve seen that look a lot in my line of work.”

“You really like her,” Dinah said sympathetically. “Barbara, I mean.”

“Yeah. I do.” Nick smiled sadly. “She’s brilliant. Funny. Beautiful…” Nick looked back the way they’d come, trying to order her thoughts. “I kinda thought the feeling might be mutual… but then every time Helena is in the room, it’s like no one else exists.”

“Barbara likes you, too.” Dinah hoped she wasn’t saying anything that would make the situation worse. “But sometimes I get tastes of what she’s feeling… not much because Barbara has her emotions so walled off from everyone. She’s like a fortress in a lot of ways. Not much gets in or out.”

“And you think she loves Helena.”

Dinah studied the other woman, nothing in Nick’s tone giving away how she felt about that fact. “I think… I think she does and hasn’t figured it out yet.”

“Dinah, Barbara is exceptionally intelligent…”

“Her brain is brilliant,” Dinah agreed, “but her heart can be as clueless as a box of rocks. She doesn’t think she has anything to offer Helena, so her mind won’t go there… except for a few traitorous moments when she almost lets herself imagine the possibilities.”

“And here I thought you were coming for a walk with me to keep me safe from Gotham’s seedier side. Instead you’re taking me to the woodshed for trying to get between them.”

“I’m not going to stop you from doing whatever you want to do. I just thought you should know what’s really going on.”

Nick bit her lip. “And where does Helena stand in all this?”

Dinah sighed. “You may have noticed they’re both stubborn…”

The doctor rolled her eyes. “So I’m creating a triangle here, huh?”

“Something like that.” Dinah eyed her sympathetically. “What are you going to do?”

Shaking her head, Nick shrugged again. “I don’t want to come between them if you’re right, but if Helena isn’t going to act on her feelings… I’ll act on mine.”

Dinah sensed nothing but sincerity from the other woman and she nodded, feeling some of the tension in her body ease. “Fair enough.”

“I assume I need to give you a little time.” Nick started walking again and the teenager fell in step beside her.

“Time?”

“Isn’t that why we’re having this discussion? You’ve got a plan for making them see how madly in love they are?”

It was the first hint of sarcasm from the doctor, but Dinah really couldn’t blame her for it. She was asking Nick to pass up a catch like Barbara after all. A little sarcasm was to be expected. “Give me two weeks.” She winced, imaging Alfred’s reaction when he learned she’d decided to interfere in a big way. 

“Two weeks it is.”

“Do you hate me right now?”

Nick smiled a little. “I don’t hate you, Dinah. I just want Barbara to be happy. I might hate Helena just a little, though.”

Dinah snorted. “She has that effect on people.”

“I mean it, though, if Helena doesn’t have the sense to embrace what’s right in front of her… I’m going to take my chances.”

“Fair enough,” Dinah said again, hoping like hell she’d given herself enough time to do the impossible.

TBC


End file.
